As a response to developing technologies, artists working in areas of new/digital media are continually inventing new concepts for self-expression – interactivity, the passage of time and resolution, just to name a few. Yet these concepts are new only in the sense that they are being adapted to new media. For example, the notion of interactivity, frequently observed as original and specific to the user-interaction component of computer-mediated works, was equally, if differently, specific to Gianlorenzo Bernini’s 17th-century Baroque sculpture and architecture. Indeed the very concept of new media, and the concomitant implication of critically significant artistic development, applies throughout history. Oil revolutionized painting in the Renaissance, as did house-paint (on canvas) in the 1950s; in the 1910s, the found object indelibly altered definitions of art, the importance of the object being subsumed by that of the concept in the 1960s. This course examines how artists working before the boom of digital technology utilized other media, techniques and approaches to effect formal, conceptual and experiential dynamics comparable to those being investigated by new media artists today. The objective of the course is to provide students with not only knowledge of the immensely rich history of artistic creativity, but also a platform through which that knowledge might be utilized to reconsider new media strategies of artistic expression. It is the goal that through observation, discussion, reading and projects (both written and hands-on), students acquire mental tools to approach their own work with an expanded understanding of artistic possibility. Organized thematically, each class focuses on a different concept derived from the field of new media production and examined with regard to artistic precedents. The course focus primarily, though not exclusively, is on 20th/21st-century art. It is conducted as a combination lecture/discussion class. Critical theory is incorporated into the readings and discussions, but this is not strictly a theory course. The course has been conceptualized and designed to enhance understanding through a variety of means, from basic observation, to exploratory conversations, to more rigorous thinking informed by lectures, readings and focused discussions.

Interactive Telecommunications (Graduate)
2 credits – 5 Weeks

Sections (Spring 2020)

ITPG-GT 2586-000 (23425)
01/31/2020 – 03/06/2020 Fri
9:00 AM – 11:00 AM (Morning)
at Brooklyn Campus
Instructed by Krantz, Georgia