About the Video Data Bank

Founded in 1976 at the inception of the media arts movement, the Video Data Bank is the leading resource in the United States for videotapes by and about contemporary artists. The VDB collections feature innovative video work made by artists from an aesthetic, political or personal point of view. The collections include seminal works that, seen as a whole, describe the development of video as an art form originating in the late 1960's and continuing to the present. The videos in our collections employ innovative uses of form and technology mixed with original visual style to address contemporary art and cultural themes. Through a national and international distribution service, the VDB makes video art, documentaries made by artists, and taped interviews with visual artists and critics available to a wide range of audiences. The Video Data Bank is supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts, which believes that a great nation deserves great art, and the Illinois Arts Council, an agency of the state.