Johan Pijnappel is a Dutch art historian/curator who has specialised in video/new media art in Asia. In the early eighties he began research on digital arts for which he became more known internationally through his publications for Academy Editions London such as World Wide Video (1993) and Art & Technology (1994). In the second half of the nineties he was co-curator of the World Wide Video Festival in Amsterdam. His focus in 1997 turned to Asia. He has curated a number of exhibitions solely on Indian and Chinese video art in Amsterdam, Mumbai, New Delhi, Seoul, Brisbane and Beijing. His latest curatorial projects are Indian Video Art: History in Motion, Fukuoka Asian Art Museum, 2004, CC: Crossing Currents-Video Art and Cultural Identity, New Delhi, 2004, The Third Seoul International Media Art Biennale, 2004/5, Dutch participation of the India Triennial, 2005, and the video art programme of the New Narratives: Contemporary Art from India at The Zimmerli Art Museum, curated by Betty Seid in 2008.
Johan Pijnappel curated the Contemporary Indian Video Art programme of MAAP in Beijing 2002 Festival, as well as holding the position of member of the Management and Artistic Advisory Committee of MAAP in Beijing 2002.