http://www.diacenter.org


The site of the DiaCenter for the Arts in New York, which for more than twenty years has played a very important and internationally recognized role in supporting, presenting, and preserving art projects created utilizing all media, has a new look. The careful use of graphics and the rigorous organization of information provide a pleasant and above all immediate consultation. Among the new items, "Artist Index" provides a list of interesting links connected in some way to each artist represented in the site. In addition, Dia on line hosts many projects created specifically for the Internet. Recently, Gary Simmons presented Wake, his first Web experiment. The section "Artists’ Web Projects" is still keeping many contributions, among which The Thief by Francis Alys, Refresh by Diller+Scofidio, and the amusing and very colorful Do you want love or lust? by Claude Closky. The site also offers useful information on many programs related to visual arts, poetry, education, and it shows a detailed calendar of all activities and events organized by the Center.

http://www.centrepompidou.fr


The Centre Pompidou, located in the heart of Les Halles in Paris, has reopened after two years of restoration work. Of course the site, available in English, French, and Spanish, underwent a structural restyling as well. The initial feeling during the visit is one of disorientation, due to the size of available data. The numerous sections are divided into sub-sections. For instance, in the area devoted to information there are also links to the museum organization, its architecture, and decidedly visitors’ concerns – guided tours, etc. It is also possible to visualize, thanks to some detailed maps, the whole building, floor by floor. Thus one is able to find out the precise location of all the works in the National Museum of Art. The site offers all information regarding the numerous activities of the Centre, such as temporary exhibitions (through April there is a show about time, its perception, its representation, and its use), conferences, and, naturally, all Museum books and publications. The site also hosts the Institute for Research and Coordination of Acoustics and Music, in English and French, with a calendar of events, and history and purpose of the Institute.

http://www.gatefoundation.nl


The Gate Foundation was started in Amsterdam in 1988. It is a foundation mainly interested in international contemporary art, that during the years has sponsored many project and activities, spurring a heated debate within multicultural realities and the so called non-western art. In the home page, under the foundation’s logo, the sentence: "The world of art has many capitals" stands out, expressing in a few words the main objectives of this Dutch institution, that is, intercultural exchange and the free circulation of ideas beyond rigid cultural barriers. In the section "Artists", the site stores documentation for artists from countries such as Brazil, Iran, South Korea, and India, who participated in exhibitions or events organized by the foundation directly or in collaboration with other foreign institutions. In addition, the site offers a section for links to many institutions or associations such as the International Institute for Asian Studies, the complete calendar of the foundation’s shows, and an art shop devoted to the sale of catalogues and multiples.

http://www.cca-kitakyushu.org


"It is essential to create a place that will allow young talented artist to ‘jump into’ creativity": this is the premise that in 1997 created the Kitakyushu Center for Contemporary Art in Japan. This is a non-profit organization with the main purpose of providing the tools for study and research in contemporary art, and generating an international network of artists, curators, critics, and other institutions. The site, rather spare as far as graphics, provides useful information, in English and Japanese, on how to participate in the yearly research program. In addition, it collects the documentation of some exhibitions that were shown in the Institute’s Project Gallery and of the relative catalogues, printed for the occasion. Marina Abramovic, Katharina Sierverding, and Lawrence Weiner are among the artists who exhibited in the CCA gallery. It is also possible to see and hear, through RealPlayer, some of their conversations.

http://www.biennale-de-lyon.org


The Biennale de Lyon created in 1991 by Thierry Raspail and Thierry Prat, arrives at the year two thousand with its fifth edition. The official site which unites, literally, the individual sites created for the two preceding demonstrations, which means that each edition presents a different interface and the contents are developed in different ways. During the edition of 1995 a CD-ROM was created through which it is possible to see the demo. For optimum viewing it is necessary to deliberately download for this. Apart from information on participating artists and their works, the site also provides critical comment. The 2000 edition, available from September, comes under the title “Partage d’exotismes”.