I feel apprehensive. I have read the intro essay on the ISEA website. As I understand it ISEA's intent is to be a proactive trip toward understanding and cohesion at the end of an otherwise disparate millennium closing. If this is a sincere attempt then it must be applauded by default because at the present moment the act of sincerity itself is such an awkward, eccentric and curious gesture.
Words are slippery and make a mockery of meaning.
When words move away they seldom return. Of course these are sensational highlights which exemplify some thoughts in my head concerning a 60's socialist thesis, a capitalist antithesis and a synthesis called incorporation. All this considered, my apprehension is now heightened. Maybe if ISEA'98-99 were not now married to words so tired. Maybe a more radical approach would be the dismantling of ISEA itself and in its place a collective, spirited embrace or acknowledgment of a convoluted and inexplicable phenomenon called art that skirts the historical altogether.