As an artist, theorist, critic, teacher, and writer, Douglas Davis played an active role in contemporary art across five decades. A pioneer of video in the 1970s, his "live" satellite performance/video pieces were seminal exercises in the use of interactive technology as a medium for art and communications. Davis was also an influential writer, authoring several books and serving as art and architecture critic for Newsweek magazine from 1969 to 1988.