Spring 2026

Introduction to Digital Fabrication

Maya Pollack | IMNY-UT 252 | TBD Meetings:14
Prerequisites: None | 4 Point, Design and Fabrication (New Structure), Elective, In-Person, No Tags, Physical Computing and Experimental Interfaces (Old Structure), Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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Do you want to MAKE THINGS with your computer? Are you an artist, engineer, designer, sculptor or architect? Are you a few of those things? How are 3D scanning and 3D modeling different? What materials should I be using? Should I be 3D printing or CNC-ing this CAD file? What is a boolean operation and why is it my new best friend? This class will answer all of your questions. Don’t know what any of these things are? This class will answer those questions also.

By the end of this course, you will be familiar with all that digital fabrication has to offer. We will cover everything from laser to 3D to CNC. You will learn how to identify which digital fabrication technique works best for your projects. But more than that, you will learn what kinds of questions you should be asking in order to complete a project from start to finish. As technology advances at rapid speeds, digital making machines and software are changing just as fast. So instead of just being taught about the machines of today, you will also be given the tools to teach yourself the machines of tomorrow. Emphasis will be put on learning how to ask the right kind of questions to successfully finish a project.

What do you want to make? Let’s make it.

IRL/URL Performing Hybrid Systems (Topics in Media Art)

Sebastian Morales | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 260 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This course is a unique collaboration between the Collaborative Arts and IMA Tisch departments, and CultureHub based at La Mama. During the pandemic many performing artists moved their work online, leading to an increasing acceptance of experimental practices that their predecessors developed in on-line work for the past 30 years. In Experiments in Hybrid (IRL/URL) Performance, students will have the opportunity to design, prototype, and present collaborative projects that build on this tradition, blending both physical and virtual elements. Over the course of the semester, students will have the opportunity to study at the CultureHub studio where they will be introduced to video, lighting, sound, and cueing systems. In addition, students will learn creative coding fundamentals allowing them to network multiple softwares and devices generating real-time feedback systems. The class will culminate with a final showing that will be presented online and broadcast from the CultureHub studio.

Modeled as an accelerated intensive on methods of collaboration, students will work together in groups of 4 to produce new performance work to be presented to an invited in person and online audience. Participation in class discussions and in-class movement workshops are mandatory, and always based on each student’s physical ability. All body types and abilities are welcome and needed for this course to be successful.

Intro To Wearables: Adorning the Head and Face for Communication (Topics in Physical Computing)

Daniel Ryan Johnston | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 240 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Art and Design (Old Structure), Elective, No Tags, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This course is designed to provide an introduction to designing wearable technology for the head, face and upper body. It will also present an overview of interaction design for the body. The class will begin with an introduction to nonverbal communication through upper body adornment as well as gesture. Next, the class will move into an E-textile 101 breakdown where we will create a simple circuit using soft materials and other sewable components (hand sewing only). After gaining an understanding of sewable electronics, the class will be working with a Nano 33 IoT along with other components. Over the weeks the class will explore the available example Arduino code in order to create interactions with LEDs and light/motion sensors. Throughout the course, the class will analyze everyday interactions and explore ways of creating wearables that interact with and communicate non-verbally to the world around us.

The course will culminate with a final project and presentation that will incorporate the tools and concepts discussed in class.

Prerequisite: Creative Computing (IMNY-UT 101)

Immersive Experiences

Thomas Martinez | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 282 | TBD Meetings:14
Prerequisites: Creative Computing or permission of the instructor | 4 Point, Elective, Media and Entertainment (Old Structure), Media Arts (New Structure), No Tags, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This course is designed to provide students with hands-on experience creating immersive experiences, with a focus on designing artistic, meaningful worlds for virtual reality headsets. The class will also touch on related technologies, methods, and fields including experience design, virtual painting, augmented reality, interactive installation, and 360 video/audio. The course materials will also include readings and discussions on prior art/relevant critical texts. This class uses VR as a lens for understanding experience design in general. Some basic familiarity with programming, image-making, and time-based media is a plus, but not required.

Communications Lab: Hypercinema or equivalent experience.

Design Skills for Responsible Media (Topics in Media Art)

Art Kleiner | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 260 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, Spring 2026, Tech and Society (New Structure), Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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Generative AI and other digital media affect people in unexpected ways. This is a course in the skills of responsible design and development of all forms of media covered by IMA and ITP. We will look critically at the belief systems that affect design, and will build skills for assessing the unexpected implications and consequences of any new digital project, including generative AI projects. Together, we will create personal and group processes to bring these issues safely to the surface, and create standards and guardrails (a “calculus of intentional risk”) that you can apply to your own work and to work you do in the future. This course is structured around three comprehensive group assignments:
1. Group project: Produce a case study of an ethical dilemma in a real-world tech company, based on news reports and other sources. How did this dilemma come about? How did the company respond? What could they have done differently? We will discuss these cases, and others, in class.
2. Group or solo project: Produce work in any format [not too elaborate] that brings an ethical issue to light.
3. Solo project: Propose a design practicum – a set of ethical standard – that would help you evaluate the impact of one or more pieces of your own work (or someone else’s you know well). Use this “calculus of intentional risk” to explore how you would change the design and use of these projects.
The class lectures will cover themes related to these three assignments, drawing on the instructors’ extensive research in the fields of organizational and technological ethics and responsibility. The recently published book, The AI Dilemma: The 7 Principles of Responsible Technology, will be one resource for the class. We will also draw on work on responsible technology going on elsewhere throughout NYU.

Game Show Design: Buzzers, Bells, and Big Ideas (Topics in Physical Computing)

Patrick Warren | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 240 | TBD Meetings:
4 Point, Elective, New, No Tags, Physical Computing and Experimental Interfaces (Old Structure), Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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Explore the art and craft of game show design in this hands-on, project-based course. Students will dive into the mechanics of classic game shows, reimagining them as analog experiences, then experimenting with mashups, blending elements of two shows into classroom-ready versions that incorporate custom buzzers, Arduino-based tech, and light fabrication. For the final project, students will work collaboratively to design and produce an original game show, incorporating technologies including, but not limited to projection mapping and live-streaming. Culminating in a live performance in the NYU Performance Garage, this course challenges students to think creatively, prototype fearlessly, and engage audiences in innovative, playful ways.

 Living Archives: Finding Stories of Peoples, Plants and Places (Topics in Media Art)

Tanika Williams | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 260 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, In-Person, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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Can a plant tell the story of your people and the planet?

This course aims to facilitate student relationships to the planet through the construction of personalized genealogies from family narratives, historical migrations, and plant relationships. Plants, like people, are intelligent life forms that hold memory and transmit knowledge. Students will study edible medicinal plants (herbs) to unlock their expertise on the past, present and future of the planet and its peoples. Participants will learn how to grow medicinal plants, employ ethical research practices, and develop their family archives.

Students will begin by examining various ways plants establish communities across the planet and studying the complex chemical and social lives of plants. Next, learners will parallel postcolonial theories of plants and peoples to connect the ways plants, like humans, seeded themselves across the globe for survival. Finally, students will incorporate primary sources from the family narrative, oral history, and government archives to help students visualize botanical imprints on their ethnic, racial, and national identities.

Learners will survey the research of botanists, horticulturalists, folk medicine practitioners, and urban gardeners. The works of Alice Walker, Toni Morrison, Jamaica Kincaid, and Fred Moten will provide the course’s literary foundation. The art practices of Fred Wilson, LaToya Ruby Frazier, Alison Janae Hamilton, and Deb Willis will create avenues for social art exploration. Importantly, students will read research from a cross section of postcolonial theorists challenging Western cartography and naming conventions of land.

About Tanika Williams: www.tanikawilliams.net

Capstone

Theo Ellin Ballew | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 400 | Mon 10:40am to 12:10pm in 370 Jay St, Room 407> Wed 10:40am to 12:10pm in 370 Jay St, Room 407 Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, Foundation, In-Person, No Tags, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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The Capstone Studio course asks students to produce an interactive project (with documentation), a research paper, and a personal portfolio.

The interactive project will illustrate students’ unique interests as well as evidence of competency within the field of interactive media production. Students are encouraged to develop their project around a theme previously explored in their work. Projects will be presented and critiqued repeatedly throughout the capstone process to peers, faculty, and industry professionals. A final presentation of the interactive project will be delivered late in the semester.

The research paper (4000-5000 words) will focus on at least one aspect of the interactive project: e.g. culture, theory, philosophy, or history, the project context, and/or production methods. For example, students may write about their project’s reception by a set of specific users, or by users who are part of a larger culture, society, or market. It is important that students think beyond the project itself and situate it in a broader context accessible through research. The research paper will include an annotated bibliography of the books and other resources they used for their research.

Students will also be guided in the production of an online portfolio to showcase their work and accomplishments to the outside world. Graduates will be evaluated by their portfolio when applying for jobs, graduate school, artist residencies, grants, and the like. Portfolios will be tailored to the demands of each student’s future goals and target audience.

Prerequisites: Only available to graduating students!

Big Ideas in the History and Future of Technology (Topics in Media Art)

Theodora Rivendale | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 260 | TBD Meetings:
4 Point, Elective, No Tags, Spring 2026, Tech and Society (New Structure), Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This class will provide students with a critical perspective on contemporary issues in media technologies and discuss the history, controversies, consequences, and ethical questions in emerging media. The first half of the class charts a history of media technologies from the 1940s to the present, focusing on the idealogical and social conditions that led to the creation of the technologies that exist now. The second half examines possible futures, and the tools we can use to predict (and build) those futures.

Instructor Website: http://alden.website

Chatbots for Art’s Sake

Carrie Sijia Wang | IMNY-UT 233 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Computation and Data (Old Structure), Elective, In-Person, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This course is designed to repurpose existing chatbot technologies and use them for the sake of art. Comprising technical labs, design workshops, thematic seminars, and creative project development, it offers an exploration of the historical, present, and future dimensions of conversational AI; and the various roles AI has played and could play in human society. Students will delve into the design elements of conversational AI, and learn to use different techniques— such as RiveScript, p5.speech, APIs, Markov Chains, and Language Models—to create functional and artistic chatbots. The course expects students to conduct research and complete creative assignments, encouraging them to express their unique artistic visions.

Physical Computing

David Rios | Jesse Simpson | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 245 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, No Tags, Physical Computing (New Structure), Physical Computing and Experimental Interfaces (Old Structure), Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This course expands the students’ palette for physical interaction design with computational media. We look away from the limitations of the mouse, keyboard and monitor interface of today’s computers, and start instead with the expressive capabilities of the human body. We consider uses of the computer for more than just information retrieval and processing, and at locations other than the home or the office. The platform for the class is a microcontroller, a single-chip computer that can fit in your hand. The core technical concepts include digital, analog and serial input and output. Core interaction design concepts include user observation, affordances, and converting physical action into digital information. Students have weekly lab exercises to build skills with the microcontroller and related tools, and longer assignments in which they apply the principles from weekly labs in creative applications. Both individual work and group work is required.

Prerequisite: Creative Computing or equivalent programming and physical computing experience.

Digital Creatures (Topics in Media Art)

Jiayi Li | IMNY-UT 260 | Fri 12:20pm to 3:20pm in Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, Media and Entertainment (Old Structure), Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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In this hands-on 3D class, students will use Blender to model, rig, texture and animate creatures inspired by nature, folklore and machines. Meant for absolute beginners, the course will cover manual and procedural modeling techniques, rigging basics for non-humanoid characters, physically based rendering (PBR) materials, painted and procedural textures, and Blender’s animation tools. Rendering will be the primary mode of exporting 3D content, with a basic introduction to exporting for interactive applications (e.g. Unity, Unreal Engine and three.js).

 Histories and Critical Media Theories of the Digital (Topics in Media Art)

Rae Bruml Norton | IMNY-UT 281 | TBD Meetings:
2 Point, Elective, New, No Tags, Spring 2026, Tech and Society (New Structure), Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This course introduces students to the various ways scholars have discussed the “digital” and its associated phenomena, including computability, information, algorithms, and networks. Drawing on classic and contemporary texts in philosophy, political economy, and media studies, we will investigate how the categories of race, class, gender, and labor are necessary to any analysis involving the production of digital technologies. If algorithms, data, and the circulation of information help constitute the digital, what kinds of work are necessary? Who does the work? We will keep these questions in mind as we clarify and critique the ways that the digital has been defined. We will take note of our different interpretations and how our various definitions of the digital change over the course of the semester.

Creative Computing

Dan O'Sullivan | Jack B. Du | Ellen Nickles | David Rios | Carrie Sijia Wang | Daniel Shiffman | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 101 | Fri 3:40pm to 6:40pm in 370 Jay St, Room 409 Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, Foundation, No Tags, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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What can computation add to human communication? Creating computer applications, instead of just using them, will give you a deeper understanding of the essential possibilities of computation. Conversely, excitement about your project ideas for using computation will best propel your acquisition of skills necessary to realize those ideas.  In this class you will learn to program the computer even if you have never coded before. But more importantly you will learn to develop a “why to program” the computer, at a personal level and a societal level.

Each week there are two small assignments, one to go further creatively with a technology introduced in class the week before, and one to respond with a blog post to writing prompts and short readings, podcasts or videos. Class time is divided into three parts, conceptual discussions of the students’ writing posts, a quick review of students’ “making” assignments, and then a workshop session getting the “hello world” of the next technical skill working before leaving class so you are ready to take it in a more creative direction during the week. 

The primary language used to teach the basics of repeat loops, variables, if statements, functions, arrays, and objects is javascript using the p5.js library.  Beyond that, the topics in the class keep up to date on the most fun and interesting new technologies, from Physical Computing to Machine Learning, to help students learn how, and more importantly, why to program the computer.

Information Design (Topics in Design)

Katherine Dillon | Yuliya Parshina-Kottas | IMNY-UT 270 | TBD Meetings:7-First Half
4 Point, Elective, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This course is designed to provide students with skills including critical thinking for designing, evaluating and appreciating visual narratives. The history and current state of information design will be explored along with hands-on application of tools and visual frameworks. Class time will include lectures, exercises, discussion and critical analysis. Students will apply the skills learned in class to a final project on a topic of interest to them.

At the completion of this course, the students will:

– Think critically about information design problems and have a framework for defining, assessing, and solving them

– Develop confidence with the vocabulary of information design and the appropriate application of the visual models

– Be familiar with best-in-class examples of information design

– Understand the power of information design as a tool of communication and persuasion

The Nature of Code: Motion (Topics in Computation and Data)

Lenin Compres | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 220 | TBD Meetings:
4 Point, Computation and Data (Old Structure), Elective, New, No Tags, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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Can we capture the unpredictable evolutionary and emergent properties of nature in software? Can understanding the mathematical principles behind our physical world help us to create digital worlds? This class focuses on the programming strategies and techniques behind computer simulations of natural systems. We explore topics ranging from basic mathematics and physics concepts to more advanced simulations of complex systems. Subjects covered include physics simulation, trigonometry, self-organization, genetic algorithms, and neural networks. Examples are demonstrated in JavaScript using p5.js.

This course covers the first six chapters of Daniel Shiffman’s The Nature of Code, introducing how motion and behavior emerge from simple physical rules. Students will explore randomness, noise, vectors, forces, oscillations, autonomous agents, and particle systems—building interactive, physics-based simulations that move, react, and evolve on screen. Through hands-on coding projects in JavaScript and p5.js, students learn to translate natural forces into digital motion, bridging physics, art, and computation to create lifelike kinetic systems. The course concludes with a look ahead to the book’s later chapters, which move beyond motion into emergent complexity—offering a glimpse of how similar principles can give rise to intelligence and self-organization in digital environments.

Prerequisites: Creative Computing

Communications Lab

Ami Mehta | Yuliya Parshina-Kottas | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 102 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, Foundation, No Tags, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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No prerequisites.

An introductory course designed to provide students with hands-on experience using various technologies including time based media, video production, digital imaging, audio, video and animation. The forms and uses of new communications technologies are explored in a laboratory context of experimentation and discussion. The technologies are examined as tools that can be employed in a variety of situations and experiences. Principles of interpersonal communications, media theory, and human factors are introduced. Weekly assignments, team and independent projects, and project reports are required

Interaction as Art Medium

Yeseul Song | IMNY-UT 253 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, Physical Computing (New Structure), Physical Computing and Experimental Interfaces (Old Structure), Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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While traditional forms of art such as painting and sculpture only expect intellectual communication with the spectator, interactive arts consider the audience as active participants and directly involve their physical bodies and actions. Interactive art invites its audience to have a conversation with the artwork or even be part of it. Well designed interactions add new meanings to the artwork and enhance effective and memorable communication with the viewer through their magical quality.

Artists have achieved interactivity in their art through different strategies based on various technologies. For example, some projects have physical interfaces such as buttons and knobs, some projects react to the audience’s presence or specific body movements, and yet others require collaborations between the audience as part of the interaction process. Some artwork involves interactions that require a long period of time for the engagement. In many of these interactive art projects, interaction methods are deeply embedded into the soul and voice of the work itself.

In this class, we will explore interaction as an artistic medium. We will be looking at interactive media art history through the lens of interaction and technology to explore their potential as art making tools. Every other week, you will be introduced to a new interaction strategy along with a group of artists and projects through lectures, discussions, and a field trip. During in-class labs and a mini hackathon, you will learn about relevant technologies and skills for the interaction strategies and build your own project to be in conversation with the artists and projects. You will also explore and discuss the future of interactions and how interactive art can contribute to innovations in interactions, and vice versa. You will also learn about how to contextualize, articulate, and communicate your project in an artistic way.

Technical topics covered in class include but are not limited to: physical computing, sensor research, sensor programming, interaction design, and body tracking using cameras (on p5.js), using depth cameras.

Learning Objectives
Critically approach and examine different interaction strategies in interactive artwork
Obtain sensibilities and techniques to translate abstract idea into interactive form (installations, objects, or systems) that is engaging to the audience
Experiment with innovative forms and artistic possibilities of interaction
Effectively utilizes computer programming, electronic circuit design, and sensors to complete an interactive project
Practice contextualizing and articulating artistic creations
Prerequisite

Creative Computing (IMA) or equivalent knowledge.

Course Requirements

This class meets once a week for 3 hours for 14 weeks. Class meetings consist of lectures, demos, in-class labs, reading discussions, feedback sessions for assignments, and group activities. There will be a mini hackathon and a field trip. Students are expected to actively participate in class, participate in discussions, prepare lab materials such as physical computing components, create their own projects, and turn in weekly assignments. Students are encouraged to book office hours with the instructor, GA, or ITP residents to ask questions, connect better with the class, and/or seek support.

Shared Minds (Topics in Computation and Data)

Dan O'Sullivan | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 220 | TBD Meetings:
4 Point, Computation and Data (Old Structure), Elective, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This class asks students to think about thinking. Based on first person introspection, meditation and readings in psychology, students will examine the experience of their minds. Then we look at how computation, in particular recent developments in AI, can better work as a medium to capture and share that experience. Class time is evenly divided between conceptual discussions around the psychology of media, looking at student work, and then learning coding skills for the following week. The early course materials direct students towards developing and implementing multi-user web apps to improve our society’s social media ecosystem but final projects often take different directions. 
 
On the technical side, the class gently picks up from any introductory javascript coding class.  Compared to Creative Computing it moves away from the p5.js in favor of vanilla javascript in an environment like Visual Studio Code assisted by AI.  The class encourages students to find a healthy balance of using “vibe coding” while maintaining the ability to specify overall architecture and debug individual lines of code. In particular the technologies covered are Replicate.com’s API’s for Machine Learning Models for generation and relation of text and images, Firebase tools for server based databases, realtime sharing, storage and authentication. Libraries like UMAP for dimension reductions, Three.js for realtime rendering, P5LiveMedia for Audio and Video sharing, and Colab for running python notebooks.

Each week students will post a quick sketch experimenting with the technology as well a short written response to a prompt together with a short reading or video.

The Code of Music

Luisa Pereira | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 222 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Computation and Data (Old Structure), Elective, In-Person, No Tags, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This course explores how sound, code, and interaction can merge to create musical experiences that invite listeners to shape the music, not just hear it. Students create a series of browser-based musical systems that respond to users, incorporate randomness, and draw patterns from existing music.

We begin by creating a series of audio-visual interfaces—an instrument, a score/mixer, and a loop-based piece—that invite deeper listening through play. Incorporating elements of sound and music production, these projects turn tools normally hidden in the studio into interactive spaces where listeners, performers, and audiences can engage with music in new ways. From there, we dive into the inner workings of music, examining how sound organizes into rhythm, melody, timbre, and harmony, and how these patterns can be expressed in code. Students design interactive studies on each musical element, reimagining tools like drum machines, sequencers, and synthesizers into experimental, playful, or educational systems that incorporate creative coding, machine listening, and machine learning techniques. 

Classes combine lectures, coding tutorials, listening sessions, design exercises, and discussions of existing interfaces. Throughout, students bring their own musical sensibilities into the work while developing their creative coding skills using p5.js and Tone.js. Students regularly share work and receive feedback, using input from the class to develop and iterate on their ideas. The semester culminates in an interactive or generative piece that builds on the semester’s studies, documented through sketches, demos, and code.

About Luisa Hors: www.luisapereira.net/

Prerequisite: Creative Computing (IMNY-UT 101)

Re-Plasticing (Topics in Fabrication)

Molly Ritmiller | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 251 | TBD Meetings:7-Second Half
2 Point, Elective, Physical Computing and Experimental Interfaces (Old Structure), Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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The central focus of this fabrication class is ‘replasticing.’ Replasticing: the act of remaking/reforming single use plastic into new objects.

In addition to learning about plastic’s properties, various forms and history, students will also learn how to fabricate and 3D Print PLA Plastic, DIY recycle and use extruders and injection molds to recast “waste” plastic in their class projects. Students will then take a close look at the waste stream in NYC and Brooklyn, and research the end-of-life cycle for plastics.

The class will culminate in a collaborative project contributing to and creating new solutions for the Tandon Makerspace in managing their excess of PLA 3D print waste. Solutions can be anything from designing recycled plastic objects and tools, to systems for community engagement and efficient processing of the PLA scraps in the Makerspace.

By creating opportunities for communities to have access to DIY recycling, we will re-imagine waste; re-configure design practices; and re-value plastic’s potential in a circular economy.

Prerequisites: Intro to Fabrication

Animation: Methods of Motion

Patrick Warren | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 288 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, Media and Entertainment (Old Structure), Media Arts (New Structure), No Tags, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This course explores the fundamentals of storytelling through animation and takes students from traditional animation techniques to contemporary forms. In the first part of the course, students will focus on traditional animation, from script to storyboard through stop-motion and character-based animation. The course then examines effective communication and storytelling through various animation and motion design techniques. Drawing skills are not necessary for this course, however, students will keep a personal sketchbook.

DIY Energy (Topics in Physical Computing)

Jeffrey Feddersen | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 240 | Tues 10:40am to 12:10pm in 370 Jay St, Room 407> Thur 10:40am to 12:10pm in 370 Jay St, Room 407 Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, No Tags, Physical Computing (New Structure), Physical Computing and Experimental Interfaces (Old Structure), Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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Energy is in everything, from the most ephemeral thought, to the rise and fall of civilizations and the evolution of the universe. Energy is the “universal currency” (Vaclav Smil) but also “a very subtle concept… very, very difficult to get right” (physicist Richard Feynman). It is precisely this combination of significance and subtlety that motivates the Energy class.

Understanding energy is useful, important, and fun. This class will help you see energy quantitatively and intuitively, and use that knowledge to make art, get your projects working better, and interpret the world around you.

How? Building on skills introduced in Creative Computing, we will generate and measure electricity hands-on in order to see and feel energy in its various forms. We will turn kinetic and solar energy into electrical energy, store that in batteries and capacitors, and use it to power projects. We will develop knowledge useful in a variety of areas, from citizen-science to off-grid installations, and address topics such as climate change and infrastructure access through the lens of energy. Students will build a final project using skills learned in the class.
Prerequisites: Creative Computing

Alter Egos

Ali Santana | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 297 | TBD Meetings:
4 Point, Elective, Media and Entertainment (Old Structure), Media Arts (New Structure), New, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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Alter Egos is a course that embraces abstract storytelling, improvisation, resourcefulness, ritual, performance and self-expression through art and technology. Students will develop original characters based on a series of stream of conscious exercises around identity. They will explore various creative techniques, including costuming, sound design, and multimedia collage while experimenting with unique methods of self expression via audio/visual performance. 

Students will assemble recycled materials, field recordings, emerging tech and textiles into costumes, props and digital worlds that embody their invented personas. This course will culminate as a live event showcasing audiovisual performances by participants in costume as their Alter Egos.

Class discussions will examine notions of identity, technology, community, health, privacy and encourage participants to venture outside of their comfort zone to radically imagine new approaches to creative expression.

Prerequisites: Communications Lab: Hypercinema
Instructor Website: http://www.alisantana.com

Networked Media

Sam Heckle | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 223 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Computation and Data (Old Structure), Elective, In-Person, No Tags, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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The network is a fundamental medium for interactivity. It makes possible our interaction with machines, data, and, most importantly, other people. Though the base interaction it supports is simple, a client sends a request to a server, which replies; an incredible variety of systems can be and have been built on top of it. An equally impressive body of media theory has also arisen around its use.

This hybrid theory and technology course will be 50% project driven technical work and 50% theory and discussion. The technical work will utilize JavaScript as both a client and server side programming language to build creative systems on the web. Technical topics will include server and client web frameworks, such as Express, HTML, CSS, templating, and databases. The theory portion of the course will include reading and discussion of past and current media theory texts that relate to the networks of today.

**** it is HIGHLY recommended you take Front End Web Development (or have equivalent front end web development experience) to get the most out of this course. We will be going over fundamentals of HTML/CSS but it would be useful to have prior knowledge ***

Prerequisite: Creative Computing or equivalent programming experience.

Video Art (Topics in Media Art)

Motomichi Nakamura | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 287 | TBD Meetings:
4 Point, Elective, Media and Entertainment (Old Structure), Media Arts (New Structure), New, No Tags, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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Video art is a time based media art form which emerged during the late 1960’s as video cameras and recorders became available to the general public.

Video art is a time based media art form which emerged during the late 1960’s as video cameras and recorders became available to the general public. In this class we will look at both the history of video art as well as new ways of implementing video and time based media installation today. The course will cover topics of projection, augmented reality, video sculpture, public art and interactive installation through a series of lectures and workshops. How do we create video artworks that are emotionally engaging with the audience while they truly represent who you are as an artist? What is a harmonious balance between art and the technologies we use? Through a series of weekly experiments and assignments, students will work with projection, video mapping and combine with various media to hack time based media into meaningful works of art. Class will be divided between lectures, guest speakers and critical discussion/presentation of work.

Experimental Photography

Ellen Nickles | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 232 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, In-Person, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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What are all the ways that you saw or made a photograph this week? How are those ways similar and different? How do those pictures function in your life and in society? What is a photograph? This course repeatedly asks these questions by using emerging computational tools to design alternative forms of making and interacting with photographs. The forms and applications of these tools, such as those for creative coding, physical computing, and AI, are explored weekly in technical tutorials and hands-on workshops. These are informed by discussions of critical debates in photography and various practitioners working with photographs, past and present. The homework includes readings, short writing responses, and photography assignments. Prerequisites: Comm Lab: HyperCinema (or similar coursework exploring communication and storytelling with digital tools) and New York’s IMA Creative Computing (or similar coursework with creative coding using the p5.js JavaScript library and programming for physical computing using Arduino microcontrollers). Note that prior experience with physical computing using the Arduino platform is required for this course. Please feel free to contact the instructor if you have any questions about the course.

Open Call (Topics in Media Art)

Blair Simmons | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 260 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Art and Design (Old Structure), Elective, Project Development and Research (New Structure), Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This class is for students interested in making, displaying and installing art for interactive media art exhibitions. This class will prepare you to apply for and develop work for open calls and everything else that happens after you are selected. The class will have an opportunity to exhibit a group show in a real NYC gallery towards the end of the semester. The students will collaborate to title, describe and document the works in the show. They will also have an opportunity to do a public talk back about their work, organize a reception and add a piece to their portfolio.

Caring for Media Arts (Topics in Media Art)

Regina Harsanyi | IMNY-UT 281 | TBD Meetings:7-Second Half
2 Point, Elective, New, No Tags, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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Drawing on the instructor’s experience as a preventive conservator and curator of time-based and digital media, this course shares strategies for proactive preservation of artworks in contemporary practices for artists. Students will learn how thoughtful documentation and technical awareness can sustain the integrity and longevity of complex artworks over time, addressing the material and digital vulnerabilities that arise from inadequate planning.

Each week, students will examine conservation case studies to understand the practical and ethical challenges of maintaining variable and evolving media. Through hands-on projects, they will apply preservation workflows to their own works-in-progress or existing projects.

Students will:

Conduct technical questionnaires and develop detailed process documentation.

Establish file naming and organizational systems suited to sustainable studio practice.

Select appropriate file formats and plan for long-term storage and migration.

Identify material vulnerabilities across digital and physical components of their work.

Engage with foundational material science principles relevant to artists and media practitioners.

Participate in collaborative preservation exercises by documenting peers’ projects and implementing shared archival protocols.

By the end of the course, students will have developed adaptable workflows that reinforce a collective responsibility to preserve contemporary art as a living, evolving practice.

Designing Interfaces for Live Performance

David Rios | IMNY-UT 243 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, In-Person, physical computing, Physical Computing (New Structure), Physical Computing and Experimental Interfaces (Old Structure), Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This course is designed to provide students with hands-on experience working with sensors and other electronics to design interfaces for a live, on stage, audio and visual performance at the end of the semester. Using Arduino, Ableton Live, and TouchDesigner, students will explore the expressive properties of physical hardware, sound, and live visuals. The forms and uses of physical computing, audio, computational media, and its application are explored weekly in both a hands on laboratory context, as well as weekly discussions of readings and existing performances.

Prerequisites: Creative Computing, Communications Lab: Hypercinema

Digital Bodies (Topics in Media Art)

Sarah Banks | IMNY-UT 260 | Thur 2:00pm to 5:45pm in No Room Required Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, No Tags, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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Digital Bodies is an intermediate 3D imaging studio course that examines and explores the current technological applications and conceptual implications of post-photographic digital human simulations. We will regularly study the work that deals with digital bodies by contemporary artists and photographers such as LaTurbo Avedon, Chen Man, Quentin Deronzier, Hyphen-lab, Hayoun Kwon, and Gregory Bennett, and many digital art platforms in various categories, such as artificial human imaging, digital fashion models, and deepfake. We will be discussing the various theories relating to the idea of cyborgs and post-human conditions. Students will be learning 3D imaging skills for building, scanning, appropriating, and customizing prefabricated body models from multiple resources, exploring their movements that both imitate and go beyond the limits of reality and expanding conceptual themes. Besides the technical exercises, students are encouraged to create semester-long self-directed research and a final project using the imaging technology they’ve learned. Artist visits, field trips, and exhibition visits will also be arranged online or according to the public health safety situation. The exhibition of the student’s final projects will be arranged at the end of the semester. *The class is suitable for students with basic skills of 3D imaging in Maya.

3D in the Browser (Topics in Media Art)

Aidan Nelson | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 220 | TBD Meetings:7-First Half
2 Point, Elective, Media and Entertainment (Old Structure), New, No Tags, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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3D in the Browser provides students with a foundation for designing and creating engaging 3D web experiences from the ground up. Students will learn aspects of 3D web programming through a series of practical exercises – drawing inspiration (as well as photos, video, audio, 3D captures, “gaussian splats” and more) from their own lives together into a series of mini-sites.   Project outcomes might include elements of collage, self-portrait, and experimental interactivity, with a focus on bringing meaningful content together in space, developing a personal aesthetic sensibility and learning to work creatively within constraints.

On the technology side, students will develop a familiarity with the three.js Javascript library for 3D rendering, techniques for gathering and preparing media content for the web, and the creative potential of emerging machine learning / artificial intelligence-enabled approaches to 3D capture (Gaussian Splats) and 3D mesh generation within this space.

Creative computing or equivalent web programming experience is a prerequisite.

Critical Experiences

Sarah Hakani | IMNY-UT 206 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Art and Design (Old Structure), Elective, In-Person, Media and Entertainment (Old Structure), No Tags, Project Development and Research (New Structure), Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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​​Critical Experience is an experiential journey through a research driven art practice rooted in care, community, and somatic inquiry. This class is based on the premise that there are many ways to know things and we can draw upon these ways of knowing and our desire to know in order to nurture a creative practice grounded in research, clear intention, and a critical lens. Critical here means: discerning, eager to participate differently, cast new light on, re-examine, course-correct.

You will be guided through traditional research methods (library and interview techniques, citations, informal ethnographies) and experience design while also being asked to cultivate intentional awareness of your own positionalities, communities, personal strengths, emotions, and desires through experimentation, hunch following, rituals, and contemplative practices.This class was created for or artists/designers who are interested in participation/interaction and its relationship to social practice, critical design, and change-making as well as individuals curious about knowing what moves them.

Why experience? The work in this class will be looked at through the lens of its ability to transform (a user, participant, audience, viewer). Interactivity is one way of doing that, but through the lens of experience design, all art is temporal and embodied.

Computational Image Deconstruction (Topics in Media Art)

Alan Winslow | IMNY-UT 260 | TBD Meetings:7-Second Half
4 Point, Elective, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This class explores how as creatives, we can take the wealth of data that each still image contains and re-purpose it. In the first few weeks of the course, students will develop an understanding of technical and creative photographic techniques through lectures, hands-on assignments, and critiques. As the class progresses, students will develop a series on a particular topic of interest (portraits, architecture, street photography). Using p5js we will explore simple scripts to extract information or manipulate the images (what are the most represented colors in the photos? What are the RGB values that make up the image? Can we add movement to the picture?). At the end of the course, students will present their series.

Prerequisite: Creative Computing
About Alan Winslow: www.alanwinslow.com

Introduction to Assistive Technology

Holly Cohen | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 241 | TBD Meetings:7-First Half
2 Point, Elective, In-Person, Physical Computing and Experimental Interfaces (Old Structure), Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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Assistive technology is a term that includes a wide variety of technologies for people with disabilities. This two-point survey course is designed to provide students with an overview of the field of assistive technology. Field trips, readings, and guest speakers will provide students with an understanding of current research and development as well as processes used in determining appropriate technologies. Weekly assignments and a final research project.

Interactive Multi-Screen Experiences (Topics in Media Art)

John Henry Thompson | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 281 | TBD Meetings:7-Second Half
2 Point, Computation and Data (Old Structure), Elective, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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We experience screens daily in many forms: in our hands, on our desktops, on walls and public installations as we travel. This course will explore the creative possibilities of real-time interactive and reactive art on screens in various forms. Using the recently developed p5VideoKit we will create standalone installations. p5VideoKit is a new library of live video effects – building on p5js – presented as a dashboard for mixing video in the browser. This library allows the user to apply visual effects to live video from connected cameras and sensors or streaming from devices on the internet. p5VideoKit is open source and can be extended with the user’s p5js code for a plethora of visual effects and interactivity. One possible application of p5Videokit would be a public facing installation allowing anonymous people on the street to use their hand held devices to interact with large street facing screens, thereby collaborating on real time creation of “digital graffiti”.

Building on Creative Computing, students will learn how to adapt simple sketches into components of p5VideoKit so that algorithms can be quickly composited and orchestrated into more complex works. Students will also learn how to edit and share code beyond the p5js editor, use nodejs/javascript to automate deployment of installations, and remotely configure dedicated computers with long running installations. Several dedicated computers and screens will be available to preview installations on the floor and street facing areas of the 370 Jay Street campus.

Prerequisites: Creative Computing or equivalent coding experience.

About John Henry Thompson: http://johnhenrythompson.com

Useless Machines

Blair Simmons | IMNY-UT 272 | Mon 12:20pm to 1:50pm in 370 Jay St, Room 410> Wed 12:20pm to 1:50pm in 370 Jay St, Room 410 Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, Spring 2026, Tech and Society (New Structure), Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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Useless Machines is about redefining “usefulness.” Through making, we will explore what it means, on an ideological, political and historical level, to create something ‘useful’ or ‘useless.’ We will play with these definitions and explore how these objects serve to be humorous, critical, disruptive and at times… useful. 

We will study ‘useless’ machines throughout history, which will provoke conversations and disagreements around the implications of existing and emerging technologies. The students will design ‘useless’ machines for their final project.  Examples of ‘useless’ machines are drawn from Kenji Kawakami’s The Big Bento Box of Unuseless Japanese Inventions, Dunne & Raby’s Speculative Everything, Stephanie Dinkins’ Conversations with Bina 48, esoteric.codes/, CW&T, Mimi Ọnụọha’s  Missing Data, Jacques Carelman’s Catalog of Impossible Objects, viral videos/objects and much more.

Instructor Blair Simmons Website: www.Blairsimmons.com

Comics (Topics in Media Art)

Tracy White | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 281 | Tues 12:20pm to 3:20pm in 370 Jay St, Room 410 Meetings:7-First Half
2 Point, Elective, In-Person, Media and Entertainment (Old Structure), Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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Open to anyone who wants to create comics regardless of drawing experience. Drawing experience UNNECESSARY! In this course students will learn the building blocks of comics – the myriad ways to pair words and images, panels, borders and color – by doing weekly assignments, in class drawing exercises and studying specific graphic novels, comics books and digital/interactive comics.

The last two weeks of class will be devoted to a specific project that can be combined with work in another class. Comics are a powerful medium to tell personal stories, narrative medicine stories, as a tool for advocacy, and for producing a riveting tale of your choosing. We will discuss how comics can be used for entertainment as well as a tool for change. Mostly we will MAKE COMICS.

Please bring:

A notebook of your choosing to class.
A uni ball black pen, fine tip.

Intro to Fabrication

Molly Ritmiller | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 242 | TBD Meetings:7-First Half
2 Point, Elective, In-Person, No Tags, Physical Computing and Experimental Interfaces (Old Structure), Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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Time to get your hands dirty. Prototypes need to be created, motors have to be mounted, enclosures must be built. Understanding how things are fabricated makes you a better maker.

But hardware is hard. You can’t simply copy and paste an object or working device (not yet anyway), fabrication skills and techniques need to be developed and practiced in order to create quality work. You learn to make by doing.

In this class you will become familiar and comfortable with all the ITP/IMA shop has to offer. We will cover everything from basic hand tools to the beginnings of digital fabrication. You will learn to use the right tool for the job.

There will be weekly assignments created to develop your fabrication techniques. There will be in class lectures, demos, and building assignments. Emphasis will be put on good design practices, material choice, and craftsmanship.

Code! 2

Dave Stein | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 2 | TBD Meetings:7-Second Half
2 Point, Elective, online, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This online course builds on concepts introduced in Code! by applying JavaScript programming skills to interactive media projects. Using the p5.js creative coding library, students will design dynamic visual experiences for the web across desktop and mobile platforms. Students will have the opportunity to experiment with topics such as sound, basic game development, body tracking, and algorithmic art. Completion of Code! or equivalent experience is required. Prior knowledge of JavaScript and the p5.js library is expected

Non-Linear Storytelling Structures

Sharon De La Cruz | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 291 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, Media Arts (New Structure), Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This course challenges how you use technology to tell a story. We will start with storytelling linear basics and progress towards non-linear storytelling and new media arts considerations. This course is helpful for participants who want more grounding in storytelling, want to strengthen their voice, and are interested in building worlds beyond the one we currently experience. This course considers a range of mediums but does not expect you to be an expert in any; it allows you to experiment and explore different mediums throughout the semester.  

We will spend the beginning of the semester researching and engaging in small assignments based on storytelling basics, primarily focused on writing and prepping storyboards and scripts, basics of visual design, and interaction design. Our midterm will ask the class to retell the same story by translating a prose text into the medium of your choice. The last section of the course will focus on a survey of new media storytelling. Students will concentrate on a final project which asks them to present a story (original or adopted) via the medium of their choice. Final projects are critiqued based on storytelling techniques discussed in class, clarity of story, and presentation. You do not have to come in with a project in mind; however, if you do, there will be plenty of space in your final assignment to explore it, considering the techniques practiced in class.

User Experience Design

Staff | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 262 | Tues 09:00am to 12:00pm in 370 Jay St, Room 411 Meetings:14
Prerequisites: None | 4 Point, Art and Design (Old Structure), Design and Fabrication (New Structure), Elective, No Tags, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This course aims to provide students with the critical thinking and practical skills for creating effective and compelling interfaces. We will dissect what a compelling user experience is and discuss and apply design methods for creating one. Throughout this 14-week course we will examine a wide range of examples of interfaces with a focus on understanding the attributes of a successful interface and applying proven research, mapping and testing techniques. The class format will include lectures, case studies, student presentations, discussions of readings and in-class design exercises. The format is very hands-on with assignments that focus on problems that are typical of those a UX designer will encounter in the professional world.

Code!

Dave Stein | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 1 | TBD Meetings:7-First Half
2 Point, Elective, online, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This online course focuses on the fundamentals of computer programming (variables, conditionals, iteration, functions & objects) using JavaScript. In particular it leverages the p5.js creative computing environment which is oriented towards visual displays on desktops, laptops, tablets or smartphones. The course is designed for computer programming novices. What can computation add to human communication? You will gain a deeper understanding of the possibilities of computation–– possibilities that will augment and enhance the perspectives, abilities and knowledge you bring from your field of study (e.g. art, design, humanities, sciences, engineering). Each week you will complete a coding exercise and reflect on your process in a short forum post along with a wrap-up assignment at the end. At first it may feel foreign, as foreign as learning a new language or way of thinking. But soon, once you get some basic skills under your belt, you’ll be able to make projects that reflect your own interests and passions.

Small-Scale Kinetic Installation (Topics in Physical Computing)

Phil Caridi | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 240 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Art and Design (Old Structure), Elective, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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Have you ever wanted to make something bigger than a tabletop? Do you like art that physically moves? Well if you answered yes to those questions then this is the class for you. Working in large site-specific formats is always an enticing proposition, this course is designed to bring students through the process of scaling a concept into a large-scale kinetic installation. Working individually at first and then moving into group work this class also teaches how to collaborate, communicate, and compromise to reach a common goal. Students will engage in a hands-on approach to designing, budgeting, and building an installation.

Prerequisites: Intro to Fab or Intro to DigiFab

 Histories and Critical Media Theories of the Digital (Topics in Media Art)

Rae Bruml Norton | IMNY-UT 281 | TBD Meetings:
2 Point, Elective, New, No Tags, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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This course introduces students to the various ways scholars have discussed the “digital” and its associated phenomena, including computability, information, algorithms, and networks. Drawing on classic and contemporary texts in philosophy, political economy, and media studies, we will investigate how the categories of race, class, gender, and labor are necessary to any analysis involving the production of digital technologies. If algorithms, data, and the circulation of information help constitute the digital, what kinds of work are necessary? Who does the work? We will keep these questions in mind as we clarify and critique the ways that the digital has been defined. We will take note of our different interpretations and how our various definitions of the digital change over the course of the semester.

 Living Archives: Finding Stories of Peoples, Plants and Places (Topics in Media Art)

Tanika Williams | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 260 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, In-Person, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
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Can a plant tell the story of your people and the planet?

This course aims to facilitate student relationships to the planet through the construction of personalized genealogies from family narratives, historical migrations, and plant relationships. Plants, like people, are intelligent life forms that hold memory and transmit knowledge. Students will study edible medicinal plants (herbs) to unlock their expertise on the past, present and future of the planet and its peoples. Participants will learn how to grow medicinal plants, employ ethical research practices, and develop their family archives.

Students will begin by examining various ways plants establish communities across the planet and studying the complex chemical and social lives of plants. Next, learners will parallel postcolonial theories of plants and peoples to connect the ways plants, like humans, seeded themselves across the globe for survival. Finally, students will incorporate primary sources from the family narrative, oral history, and government archives to help students visualize botanical imprints on their ethnic, racial, and national identities.

Learners will survey the research of botanists, horticulturalists, folk medicine practitioners, and urban gardeners. The works of Alice Walker, Toni Morrison, Jamaica Kincaid, and Fred Moten will provide the course’s literary foundation. The art practices of Fred Wilson, LaToya Ruby Frazier, Alison Janae Hamilton, and Deb Willis will create avenues for social art exploration. Importantly, students will read research from a cross section of postcolonial theorists challenging Western cartography and naming conventions of land.

About Tanika Williams: www.tanikawilliams.net

Chatbots for Art’s Sake

Carrie Sijia Wang | IMNY-UT 233 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, In-Person, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
Show Course Description

This course is designed to repurpose existing chatbot technologies and use them for the sake of art. Comprising technical labs, design workshops, thematic seminars, and creative project development, it offers an exploration of the historical, present, and future dimensions of conversational AI; and the various roles AI has played and could play in human society. Students will delve into the design elements of conversational AI, and learn to use different techniques— such as RiveScript, p5.speech, APIs, Markov Chains, and Language Models—to create functional and artistic chatbots. The course expects students to conduct research and complete creative assignments, encouraging them to express their unique artistic visions.

 Living Archives: Finding Stories of Peoples, Plants and Places (Topics in Media Art)

Tanika Williams | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 260 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, In-Person, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
Show Course Description

Can a plant tell the story of your people and the planet?

This course aims to facilitate student relationships to the planet through the construction of personalized genealogies from family narratives, historical migrations, and plant relationships. Plants, like people, are intelligent life forms that hold memory and transmit knowledge. Students will study edible medicinal plants (herbs) to unlock their expertise on the past, present and future of the planet and its peoples. Participants will learn how to grow medicinal plants, employ ethical research practices, and develop their family archives.

Students will begin by examining various ways plants establish communities across the planet and studying the complex chemical and social lives of plants. Next, learners will parallel postcolonial theories of plants and peoples to connect the ways plants, like humans, seeded themselves across the globe for survival. Finally, students will incorporate primary sources from the family narrative, oral history, and government archives to help students visualize botanical imprints on their ethnic, racial, and national identities.

Learners will survey the research of botanists, horticulturalists, folk medicine practitioners, and urban gardeners. The works of Alice Walker, Toni Morrison, Jamaica Kincaid, and Fred Moten will provide the course’s literary foundation. The art practices of Fred Wilson, LaToya Ruby Frazier, Alison Janae Hamilton, and Deb Willis will create avenues for social art exploration. Importantly, students will read research from a cross section of postcolonial theorists challenging Western cartography and naming conventions of land.

About Tanika Williams: www.tanikawilliams.net

Chatbots for Art’s Sake

Carrie Sijia Wang | IMNY-UT 233 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, In-Person, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
Show Course Description

This course is designed to repurpose existing chatbot technologies and use them for the sake of art. Comprising technical labs, design workshops, thematic seminars, and creative project development, it offers an exploration of the historical, present, and future dimensions of conversational AI; and the various roles AI has played and could play in human society. Students will delve into the design elements of conversational AI, and learn to use different techniques— such as RiveScript, p5.speech, APIs, Markov Chains, and Language Models—to create functional and artistic chatbots. The course expects students to conduct research and complete creative assignments, encouraging them to express their unique artistic visions.

 Histories and Critical Media Theories of the Digital (Topics in Media Art)

Rae Bruml Norton | IMNY-UT 281 | TBD Meetings:
2 Point, Elective, New, No Tags, Spring 2026, Undergraduate
Last updated: October 23, 2025
Show Course Description

This course introduces students to the various ways scholars have discussed the “digital” and its associated phenomena, including computability, information, algorithms, and networks. Drawing on classic and contemporary texts in philosophy, political economy, and media studies, we will investigate how the categories of race, class, gender, and labor are necessary to any analysis involving the production of digital technologies. If algorithms, data, and the circulation of information help constitute the digital, what kinds of work are necessary? Who does the work? We will keep these questions in mind as we clarify and critique the ways that the digital has been defined. We will take note of our different interpretations and how our various definitions of the digital change over the course of the semester.

 Living Archives: Finding Stories of Peoples, Plants and Places (Topics in Media Art)

Tanika Williams | Syllabus | IMNY-UT 260 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, In-Person, Spring 2026
Last updated: October 23, 2025
Show Course Description

Can a plant tell the story of your people and the planet?

This course aims to facilitate student relationships to the planet through the construction of personalized genealogies from family narratives, historical migrations, and plant relationships. Plants, like people, are intelligent life forms that hold memory and transmit knowledge. Students will study edible medicinal plants (herbs) to unlock their expertise on the past, present and future of the planet and its peoples. Participants will learn how to grow medicinal plants, employ ethical research practices, and develop their family archives.

Students will begin by examining various ways plants establish communities across the planet and studying the complex chemical and social lives of plants. Next, learners will parallel postcolonial theories of plants and peoples to connect the ways plants, like humans, seeded themselves across the globe for survival. Finally, students will incorporate primary sources from the family narrative, oral history, and government archives to help students visualize botanical imprints on their ethnic, racial, and national identities.

Learners will survey the research of botanists, horticulturalists, folk medicine practitioners, and urban gardeners. The works of Alice Walker, Toni Morrison, Jamaica Kincaid, and Fred Moten will provide the course’s literary foundation. The art practices of Fred Wilson, LaToya Ruby Frazier, Alison Janae Hamilton, and Deb Willis will create avenues for social art exploration. Importantly, students will read research from a cross section of postcolonial theorists challenging Western cartography and naming conventions of land.

About Tanika Williams: www.tanikawilliams.net

Chatbots for Art’s Sake

Carrie Sijia Wang | IMNY-UT 233 | TBD Meetings:14
4 Point, Elective, In-Person, Spring 2026
Last updated: October 23, 2025
Show Course Description

This course is designed to repurpose existing chatbot technologies and use them for the sake of art. Comprising technical labs, design workshops, thematic seminars, and creative project development, it offers an exploration of the historical, present, and future dimensions of conversational AI; and the various roles AI has played and could play in human society. Students will delve into the design elements of conversational AI, and learn to use different techniques— such as RiveScript, p5.speech, APIs, Markov Chains, and Language Models—to create functional and artistic chatbots. The course expects students to conduct research and complete creative assignments, encouraging them to express their unique artistic visions.

 Histories and Critical Media Theories of the Digital (Topics in Media Art)

Rae Bruml Norton | IMNY-UT 281 | TBD Meetings:
2 Point, Elective, New, No Tags, Spring 2026
Last updated: October 23, 2025
Show Course Description

This course introduces students to the various ways scholars have discussed the “digital” and its associated phenomena, including computability, information, algorithms, and networks. Drawing on classic and contemporary texts in philosophy, political economy, and media studies, we will investigate how the categories of race, class, gender, and labor are necessary to any analysis involving the production of digital technologies. If algorithms, data, and the circulation of information help constitute the digital, what kinds of work are necessary? Who does the work? We will keep these questions in mind as we clarify and critique the ways that the digital has been defined. We will take note of our different interpretations and how our various definitions of the digital change over the course of the semester.