from today's new york times - check the last line.
[and, steve and i had a sombre drink at the mall of america in minneapolis yesterday... further thoughts about the situation will follow when i've landed back in the uk... best wishes from schipol airport... sarah]
MINNEAPOLIS: INTERNET ART LAYOFFS The Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, which has been a strong supporter of Internet art, has dismissed the curator for its online art projects. Steve Dietz, the center's new-media curator, and six other Walker staff members were laid off in a cost-cutting move that is expected to save more than $1 million annually, officials there said last week. Although the Walker is proceeding with a $90 million expansion scheduled to open in 2005, the center's director, Kathy Halbreich, said plans to build a digital-art gallery would be deferred for at least five years. Magda Sawon, director of Postmasters Gallery, a new-media gallery in Chelsea, Manhattan, said Mr. Dietz "was the most active, innovative and accomplished curator of new media in this country." Under Mr. Dietz, who joined the Walker in 1996, the center has vigorously supported the notion of the Internet as a creative medium by commissioning a series of online-only artworks and organizing several Web-based exhibitions. Mr. Dietz also acquired äda'web, an important collection of early Internet art, for the center's Web site (www.walkerart.org). Ms. Halbreich said she intended to keep the projects online but could not commit to doing so until the cost was determined.
MATTHEW MIRAPAUL
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