Red Burns and NYU-ITP
In spring of 1982 we were living in Montreal. Ben was about a year old and I was 37. One day out of the blue I got a call from Red Burns. (No iPhones in those days.) This caught me by surprise because I really didn’t know Red. In fact, I’d only recently made her acquaintance (only a handshake and a “how do you do.” ) at conference in NY where I was giving a talk on the human perception of computer graphic displays. This talk was heavy on cognitive theory but very light on technology. It was curious to be getting a call from Red since I knew she was involved a project about telecommunications known as ITP—nothing to do with not human cognition. True to form. Red got right the point. She said something like, “I have a feeling that you are going to be a very important person in my life. I’m taking over a program on telecommunication and computers in the Tisch School of the Arts at NYU. And I want to hire you as a full-time professor.” I said, “Red, you hardly know me.” She said, “I just have a feeling about you. But I don’t care about any of this ‘cognitive shit’.”
ILooking back I do realize that my brilliant talk was only a small part of why Red was offering me a job at ITP. Her goal was more strategic and had to do with NYU politics. At the time was ITP was changing its status from being a non-degree NYU institute to a degree granting Masters Program housed in the Tisch School of the Arts. Red’s co-founder of ITP was Martin Elton. He was a tall Englishman (Cambridge mathematician—see picture) who reminded me of Jeremy Irons. Red and Martin had partnered in a major NSF funded program looking at the role of cable technology in helping people in elder care facilities stay connected. Both Martin and Red were instrumental in the proposal that would transform ITP into an academic program. But they had different visions. Martin wanted the masters program to be primarily about operations research with a focus on telecommunications. Red was less focused, but she intuited that the future of ITP was less about the telecom business than about social change and the arts.
Here’s where I come in. I was, I think, a compromise. Martin knew me as a somewhat respected academic who had an interest in communications technology. I had worked for Bell-Northern Research and had received grants from the Canadian department of communications. Red knew me only briefly. But here’s where the social network kicks in. It’s a little complicated, but bear with me. In her youth growing up Ottawa, Red’s best friend was a woman named Gudren (Islandic). I can’t remember her last name. Gudren’s daughter was a stunningly beautiful girl named Martha (see picture). Martha had been recently married to Adam Gopnik who was at the time doing a degree in Art History at NYU and wad living in New York. Adam — who is now a well-known writer and intellectual with the New Yorker — had become friends with Red via Martha via Gudren. I knew Adam because his father, Irwin Gopnik, had been on my doctoral thesis committee and was a cherished colleague of Al Bregman my doctoral thesis advisor. In fact, I hired Adam — who was in his early twenties at the time- to write a section of my report for the Canadian telecom group on art and perception.’
I could say a lot more about how important gymnastics became in my life, not only in terms of training and the mix of aesthetics, strength and flexibility (also I got to wear white tights and slippers for special events), but also in terms of the friendships. In fact, I reconnected with one of these friends a few years ago having lost touch for 40 years. Pictured below is Kenn Henderson who was probably the best gymnast in New England when I got to know him back in the mid 60’s. I reconnected with Kenn via Youtube when I stumbled on him playing folk guitar. Turns out he had been in San Francisco since the mid 70’s. We’ve stayed in touch since.
I know. It’s complicated, but hang in there. I think what happened was that Red was complaining to Adam and Martha, now in New York, that she couldn’t find someone who could fill this new post at ITP who could be acceptable to both her and Martin. Adam said, “how about Mike Mills?” My theory is that this made some kind of sense to Red. I could perhaps help bridge the gap between technology (Martin) and the Arts (Red). And you know what? I did! And then some.
I should add, that I almost didn’t take the job with Red. At the same time, I was being recruited by the Children’s Television Workshop who had begun making educational games based on Sesame Street. I had become very good friends with Leona Schauble who was the director of research there. That’s also where I met Jonathan Cohen and — wait for it — Mike Eisenberg who was good friends with Leona. I interviewed CCW and almost took a position there being offered by Leona, but it fell through at the last minute. So that’s how ended up at ITP. And if I do say so myself, I saw very clearly that the future ITP wasn’t as an MBA in Operations Research, but a marriage of the Arts (we were housed the Tisch School of the Arts by the way) and computing. So I taught myself LOGO/LISP and Director and began a couple of projects that merged computing with the arts and communication as well the core course on “Computational Media.” Hence, the Active Eye guidebook and softrware that caught the attention of folks at Apple, led to Quicktime and, I believe, significantly played a role in the evolution of ITP as quirky, little known program to a world class program marrying the arts and computation. That’s maybe another story.
Oh, I should mention how this history has impacted not only ITP, Apple and the like, but Ben Leduc-Mills. Another story.
Here’s a great picture of me and Red.
