A symposium to celebrate the first issue of ICC’s quarterly journal InterCommunication. The panelists included Edmond COUCHOT (computer arts theorist), Université Paris XIII, currently researching the application of digital technology in the visual arts; Jonathan CRARY (art historian), Columbia University, member of the editorial board of ZONE, a journal of contemporary culture and art theory; and InterCommunication’s four editorial committee members: ASADA Akira (social philosopher), ITOH Toshiharu (art critic), TAKEMURA Mitsuhiro (media aesthetician), and HIKOSAKA Yutaka (architect). In addition, thanks to a video conference system over international ISDN between the symposium hall and a Paris studio, the symposium enjoyed the presence of Paul VIRILIO (theorist), director of Ecole Spéciale d’Architecture in Paris and a critical thinker who has founded and developed the field of speed studies, or dromologics (dromologie). The discussion turned on the following topics: the remote technologies (telematics) that cover the entire globe with real-time networks (VIRILIO), the information technologies (informatics) that have given rise to the universe of virtual reality (COUCHOT), and the hierarchical coexistence of contradictory overlaying domains of new and old communication in relation to the perceiving subject (CRARY). The debate unfurled into a three and a half hour comprehensive examination of the effect that new technologies have on society and art culture—an appropriate tribute to the inaugural issue of InterCommunication, a journal that supports the theoretical backbone of ICC’s activities. The record of this symposium was published in the first issue of InterCommunication.

Panelists: Edmond COUCHOT, Jonathan CRARY, Paul VIRILIO, ASADA Akira, ITOH Toshiharu, HIKOSAKA Yutaka, and TAKEMURA Mitsuhiro