User:Seancuttlefish
Sean Clark
Sean Clark is an independent artist, researcher, and educator based in Leicester, as well as the curator of the Computer Arts Archive. He is a member of the R10 Electronic Media Studio, the director of Interact Digital Arts, and the chair of the Computer Arts Society.
He began his working career at Loughborough University in 1989 as a research assistant for Stephen Scrivener in the LUTCHI Research Centre, which was led by Ernest Edmonds. As a researcher, magazine writer, and software developer throughout the 1990s, he actively promoted the adoption of the internet. He launched his first public website on the subject of Virtual Reality in 1993. After transitioning from academia to industry in 1995, he developed first-generation websites for numerous well-known companies. During this period, he grew increasingly involved in digital art and multimedia projects, collaborating with visual artists and working with bands including The Shamen, Zion Train, and Higher Intelligence Agency.
To allow him to focus more on his music, arts, and community interests, Sean Clark founded web design company Cuttlefish Multimedia in 2000. This coincided with a shift in his creative focus from Derby and Nottingham to Leicester, and in 2002, he created Leicester's Pineapster music community. In the mid- to late-2000s, he worked closely with Leicester's Bathysphere music label and ran the Stench electronic music events. In 2011, he opened The Interact Gallery, the city's first independent digital art gallery. In 2013, he set up Interact Labs, a digital art education and maker space at Phoenix in Leicester, and then co-founded Leicester Hackspace in 2014. In 2016, he launched the Leicester digital arts company Interact Digital Arts and was co-winner, with Esther Rolinson, of the Lumen Prize for 3D/Sculpture and the inaugural ArtCHI award. He was awarded a PhD in Computational Art in 2018 from De Montfort University, and in 2020, he started the Leicester-based Community Interest Company, the Computer Arts Archive.
As well as creating new artwork, Sean Clark is currently interested in researching Leicester's digital art and electronic music heritage, the preservation of early British Cybernetic Art, and 1990s/2000s live multimedia. He has long supported Leicester's grassroots digital art community and continues to run workshops, mentorship, exhibitions and live events.