For the past 20 years, Illinois Tech has led a multi-institutional team for the development of the Intracortical Visual Prosthesis (ICVP), which is designed to communicate image information directly to the brain, bypassing the eyes and optic nerves. An 8-institution team, funded by the NIH BRAIN Initiative, has brought the technology to a current clinical trial for the purpose of determining how people with severe visual impairment might be able to use this artificial vision as a visual aid. The project began in 1970 at the NIH and has seen a long history of technological development coupled with enhanced understandings about how and why people with blindness might benefit from the ICVP system. This presentation will describe the technology and report on our unique work to understand experiences and motivations of potential clinical trial participants, as well as those of others who have experienced earlier brain-based visual prosthesis systems.