MIAMI, FL.-American art historian and curator Christopher Eamon has been entrusted with planning this year's «Art Video Lounge». He has put together eleven programs featuring works by over thirty internationally known ar-tists. The pieces have been selected to offer a broad sur-vey of contemporary trends in film and video art. This year, for the first time, the «Art Video Lounge» will be loca-ted in the Botanical Garden Building. With its new design, it will offer visitors a relaxed atmosphere in which to view the video works. The «Art Video Lounge» is open daily (November 30 through December 4) from 11 a.m. until 8 p.m. It is open to the public; admission is free.

Art Basel Miami Beach has appointed Christopher Eamon as the new curator of the «Art Video Lounge» platform of the in-ternational art show. Eamon is Director of the New Art Trust, San Francisco, and Curator of the distinguished Pamela and Richard Kramlich Collection, San Francisco. He was previously with the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. The New York art historian and curator made his name with exhi-bitions like «Video Acts: Single Channel Video from the Collec-tions of Pamela and Richard Kramlich and New Art Trust» (2002/2003) at the PS1/Museum of Modern Art, New York, and ICA London; «In Sync: Cinema and Sound in the Work of Julie Becker and Christian Marclay» (2001) at the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; and «Bill Viola: The Crossing» (1998) at the Aspen Art Museum.

The roster of the «Art Video Lounge» comprises 11 programs on such subjects as «The Living Museum,» «Duos,» «What to Make of Language,» «A Kind of a Portraiture,» and «Qu'est ce que c'est performance?» (program see http://www.ArtBasel.com).

This year's «Art Video Lounge» wants to provide a broad sur-vey of the various trends in video art: experimental document-tary, performance video, appropriation and reality TV, activist television, conceptualist and post-minimalist practices, the cinematic and the "new" documentary. There will be historical recordings from the sixties to the nineties, but also a wide selection of the very latest work in the field.

Among the artists in the curated program are Pipilotti Rist, Michael Snow, Robert Barry, Kim Soo-ja, Kai Kaljo, Valie Export, Seth Price, Kris Lefko, Cao Fei, LiliDujouri, Fikrit Atay, Yvonne Rainer, John Pilson, and Yang Fudong.

There will be a separate room containing a substantial video-theque of around 100 works for interested visitors to choose from and watch individually.

This year, for the first time, the «Art Video Lounge» will be located in the Botanical Garden Building, 2000 Convention Center Drive (access from Miami Beach Convention Center, Hall D). The newly designed lounge invites visitors to make fascinating discoveries and explore up-to-the-minute video art.