Course Description


What does it mean to perform through/with/in digital media? How can artists harness new media and available technology for performance work? Further, how do we perform the daily use of technology? To investigate these questions we will begin by examining avant-garde practices in theater and literature during the 50s, 60s and 70s together with media art of the 80s and 90s. We will then trace these foundations within contemporary approaches to performance work. While pursuing the practice, history, and theory of performing in and through media, students develop a final project that responds to class themes. An emphasis on concept ensures that students of all technical levels are welcome to engage in theater workshops, class writing exercises, and technical labs Short curated readings will augment our creative practice and fall within broad categories: theoretical texts in performance and media, scripts, interventions in online communities, screenings of installation and performance documentation, video art, games, digital literature, sound recordings, project pamphlets, and reviews. To inspire our work in emerging genres we will consider a variety of artists that perform with media beyond the confines of a computer screen including : The Wooster Group, Alan Sondheim, Laurie Anderson, Judd Morrissey & Mark Jeffery, Nico Muhly, Lynn Hershman, Brian Eno, Janet Cardiff, and George Higgs.


Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Week 3. Assignment for 1/18/11


NO CLASS 1/17/11! will find an agreed upon time for a make-up session as outlined by RISD policy.

Assignment 1:
  1. General Assignment–come to class with a well thought out sketch or made object of your final. Be prepared to workshop ideas. Your work should reflect about a week's worth of effort and investment. For the sake of time and numbers, I am opening-up the final to collaborative group work as an option. Groups must be small and driven by equal effort from its members.
    2. or
  2. Optional Prompts–create a virtual or physical art object/performance that responds to your research on a basic definition of one of the following class concepts (feel free to suggest another concept to me that is based in digital culture or computer processes):
Surveillance/Capture
Feedback loop
Non-linearity
Signal
Interrupt
Interface
Digital vs. Analog
Archive/Memory
Assignment 2–Reading and Resources:
This week we will be going over some digital concepts. This would have been the assignment we had addressed if we had class on Monday.
  1. Read Lev Manovich's section in The New Media Reader titled “What is New Media? Eight Propositions”. I have excerpted this from a longer article and made a pdf here.
  2. Review the net.art pages at the bottom of the first week's packet here (in gray).
    3. Artists:
  3. Check out Justin Katko from Name in Lights
  4. Check out Jason Nelson
  5. Check out Jodi and experiment with different variations of entering the URL. Also try clicking "View" "Page Source" in your browser's menu.
  6. Tate Modern exhibition on surveillance
  7. Surveillance Camera Players
If you were inspired by last week's links check out Ted Talks: John Crawford-Embodied Media in Performance
Posted by sgorman at 10:48 PM

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