Peter Lunenfeld

Who is Peter Lunenfeld?

Peter Lunenfeld is a critic and theorist of digital media. He is a professor in the Design|Media Arts department at UCLA, director of the Institute for Technology and Aesthetics, and founder of mediawork: The Southern California New Media Group.

Lunenfeld is a leading figure in digital aesthetic theory, set on establishing philosophical quandaries regarding digital technology and its role in art, design and culture. His most famous book, Snap to Grid incorporates traditional and continental theories of art to account for digital media. His work revolves around the discources of technology, aesthetics, and cultural theory, establishing the complexity of digital aesthetics while simultaneously categorizing it.

His books include USER:InfoTechnoDemo, Snap to Grid, and The Digital Dialectic. He is the editorial director of the highly designed Mediawork pamphlet series for the MIT Press. These award-winning "theoretical fetish objects" cover the intersections of art, design, technology, and market culture. Included in the series is Utopian Entrepreneur by Brenda Laurel, designed by Denise Gonzales Crisp; Writing Machines by N. Katherine Hayles, designed by Anne Burdick; Rhythm Science by Paul D. Miller aka DJ Spooky that Subliminal Kid, designed by COMA; and, Shaping Things by Bruce Sterling, designed by Lorraine Wild. Lev Manovich, the author of The Language of New Media, lauded these 100 page "mind bombs" in the tradition of McLuhan and Fiore¹s The Medium is the Massage as a new operating system for the book.