40°44′49.58″N 74°0′25.64″W / 40.7471056°N 74.0071222°W / 40.7471056; -74.0071222

Eyebeam is a not-for-profit art and technology center in New York City, founded by John Seward Johnson III with co-founders David S. Johnson and Roderic R. Richardson.

Originally conceived as a digital effects and coding atelier and center for youth education, Eyebeam has become a center for the research, development, and curation of new media works of art and open-source technology. Eyebeam annually hosts up to 20 residents and co-produces youth educational programs, exhibitions, performances, symposia, workshops, hackathons and other events with these residents as well as with partner organizations. Projects developed at Eyebeam have received awards and recognition including Webby Awards, Guggenheim Fellowships, and the Prix Ars Electronica.

Eyebeam, originally called Eyebeam Atelier, was first conceived as a collaboration between David S. Johnson, a digital artist, and John Seward Johnson III, a filmmaker and philanthropist. The two were introduced by Roderic R. Richardson, a mutual friend who recognized their shared interests and helped establish the new venture in its early stages. The inspiration to name the project Eyebeam Atelier came partly from the sculpture atelier of John Johnson's father, John Seward Johnson II and the Experiments in Art and Technology collective, although David Johnson had also used the name Eyebeam Simulations for a start-up location-based VR entertainment concept before meeting Roderic or John Johnson. After observing new media as a growing genre, the co-founders were motivated to create a similar studio. They recognized a need to provide artists and digital film artists access to new technology and a shared workspace.

In addition to offering resources for new media artists, Johnson saw a need to provide middle and high school students with educational and artistic opportunities. Digital Day Camp, the first youth program which catered to new media education, was founded in 1998; in the pilot program, New York-based high school students learned web development and design. Future sessions included project-based learning around themes of bioart, urban interventionism, game design, and wearable technology.

Eyebeam's first forum, "Interaction", took place online in the summer of 1998 and was curated by UCSD professor Jordan Crandall. The forum, an email list called <eyebeam><blast>, was hosted by Brian Holmes, Olu Oguibe, and Gregory Ulmer, and included Lev Manovich, N. Katherine Hayles, Saskia Sassen, Matthew Slotover, Ken Goldberg, Geert Lovink, Knowbotic Research, Hans-Ulrich Obrist, Bracha Lichtenberg Ettinger, Mark Tribe, and Critical Art Ensemble among the participating artists, educators, new media and internet theorists, and technologists (cite). The discussions spurred by <eyebeam><blast> were compiled into a book titled Interaction: Artistic Practice on the Network and published in 2001.

In addition to funding artistic research, Johnson hoped to develop Eyebeam as a space that would also function as a museum devoted to new media works. In 2000, Eyebeam announced an international architectural competition to construct a space devoted to the dialog between art and technology, with the design firm Diller + Scofidio's "Olympic class" design named the winner of the competition.

Eyebeam held its first open studios for artists in residence and fellows in 2002. Alexander R. Galloway, G. H. Hovagimyan, Tony Martin, Yael Kanarek, MTAA, John Klima, Jem Cohen, Cory Arcangel, and Michael Bell-Smith were among the inaugural exhibitors.^{[citation needed]} Among the projects on display was Galloway's Carnivore, a Processing library that allowed for the creative misuse of data surveillance created in tandem with other members of Radical Software Group. Carnivore takes its name and function from DCS1000, a surveillance system used by the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation. Carnivore was awarded the Prix Ars Electronica Golden Nica the same year.^{[citation needed]}