Contexts
From Visual Studies
Visual Studies is a hybrid discipline; a recombination of various skills, technologies, and knowledges. Hybrid disciplines are rich with connections to a wide range of disciplines and practices.
Contents |
Academic Context
The Visual Studies program is one of eight emphasis areas offered at GVSU that include: Painting, Printmaking, Graphic Design, Metalsmithing, Ceramics, Sculpture and Illustration. The curriculum is designed to operate in combination with the other studio areas.
The study of Art History is very important to the learning experience in Visual Studies. Adopting a hybrid studio discipline requires an intensive and ongoing inquiry in the history and theory of Visual Culture. This knowledge provides important contextual details and can serve as a framework for Visual Studies which unlike other studio disciplines lacks a long and specific disciplinary history. The study of Art History is also of great benefit to studio practice because of the focussed development of analytic, critical, and language skills in relation to the visual.
The Art and Design Department is a part of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at GVSU. Many disciplines other than Art address material and human experience and the processes of creating and using cultural forms. Recent scholarship in many fields reflect the increasingly visual nature of global culture. The Visual Studies curriculum is designed to acknowledge and highlight these interdisciplinary relationships.
Related Academic Disciplines
Of particular relevance are:
- Sociology, Anthropology, Psychology, Geography, Political Science
- Philosophy and Liberal Studies
- Writing, Literature, Music, Theater, Dance, Film Video, Photography
- Communications
- Media Studies
- Computer Science
- Sciences
- Education
- Public Administration
Related Programs
Here are some similar programs at other schools.
- The University of Michigan curriculum emphasizes both media and concepts. An interdisciplinary structure, incorporation of digital media and context represent similarities in this program and Visual Studies at GVSU.
- Public Art and New Artistic Strategies, Bauhaus University, Weimar, Germany -Students focus on art projects that go beyond the protective space of the museum and gallery. The points of departure are the different strategies and interventions of artists working in public space today. Urban configurations, parks and gardens, landscapes and new media are all included within the definition of public space. The definition also includes works which are communicated through radio, television or the internet. The goal of the course of study is to prepare the students to deal with the particular situation of art in association with and in the public realm, and to enable effective artistic interventions in public space. Faculty member Liz Bachhuber lectured at the Civic Studio CentralStation Project in 2006.
- The Intermedia Area of The University of Iowa School of Art & Art History is an interdisciplinary program committed to experimental, hybrid creative research, development and production in time-based media, installation, community-based practice and new media. Intermedia area offers BFA, two-year MA, and three-year MFA degrees programs.
- http://visualstudies.buffalo.edu/undergraduate/overview/concentrations/vs.html
- http://www.cca.edu/academics/visualstudies/
- A recent Conference Share, Share Widely addressed these perspectives in the organization of "new media education". The conference web site documents various issues and serves as an orientation to the field. the Interviews section serves as a quick overview of issues and leaders in the field. The links section is a useful connection to additional resources. Much of the current discourse is consistent with the way the new emphasis is organized; around cultural practice, while incorporating training in technology.
World Context
Here are some projects and programs that engage New Media and Expanded Practice in clear and special ways.
- "Creative Time presents the most innovative art in the public realm. From our base in New York, we work with artists who ignite the imagination and explore ideas that shape society. We initiate a dynamic conversation among artists, sites, and audiences, in projects that enliven public spaces with free and powerful expression." - Creative Time Mission
Creative Time has no fixed space so every project takes on unique consideration of context of presentation. Projects engage public space using various forms of Extended Practice. Of particular interest in New Media are the projects The 59th Minute, projects shown on the large screen in times square, and Art in the Anchorage which included numerous media exhibitions, performances, and sound works in the Granite base of the Brooklyn Bridge.
- Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe, Germany -As a cultural institution, the Center for Art and Media (ZKM) in Karlsruhe holds a unique position in the world. It responds to the rapid developments in information technology and today's changing social structures. Its work combines production and research, exhibitions and events, coordination and documentation.
- Fused Space -International Competition for New Technology In/As Public Space.
- Ars Electronica -More than two decades of work with international media art and cutting edge technologies and the discussion of their influences on life, work and society offer a rich basis for the transfer of knowledge and skills. Up-to-date courses at the Ars Electronica Center in Linz, Upper Austria, are complemented by the Symposiums as parts of the annual Festival and the ever growing resources of the Online Archives.
- Soft Cinema: Ambient Narrative Soft Cinema project mines the creative possibilities at the intersection of software culture, cinema, and architecture. Its manifestations include films, dynamic visualizations, computer-driven installations, architectural designs, print catalogs, and DVDs. In parallel, the project investigates how the new representational techniques of soft(ware) cinema can be deployed to address the new dimensions of our time, such as the rise of mega-cities, the "new" Europe, and the effects of information technologies on subjectivity.
- Vectors, Journal of Culture and Technology Vectors maps the multiple contours of daily life in an unevenly digital era, crystallizing around themes that highlight the social, political, and cultural stakes of our increasingly technologically-mediated existence. As such, the journal will speak both implicitly and explicitly to key debates across varied disciplines, including issues of globalization, mobility, power, and access. Operating at the intersection of culture, creativity, and technology, the journal focuses on the myriad ways technology shapes, transforms, reconfigures, and/or impedes social relations, both in the past and in the present.
- Creative Capital is an organization that regularly gives grants to contemporary American artists. Creative Capital was started in response to the ending of the National Endowment for the Arts Fellowships to Individual Artists. Follow this link to an index of Creative Capital Grantees.Of the 158 projects that Creative Capital has supported in its 6 years of giving grants to american artists, 42 of the projects are in areas addressed in visual studies.
- The 2004 Whitney Biennial exhibit is available online with links to artist's works and assigned "mediums". Of the 108 artists selected for the exhibition 66 of them have designated mediums that would be addressed in the proposed new emphasis. To review these artists go to the 2004 Whitney Biennial site. Once the site has loaded click on "Explore Biennial Art and Artists", then click on "organize artists by medium". From here you can select various media or themes and view the artists projects. Areas addressed in the new emphasis include: installation, video, performance, digital art, conceptual ideas, net art, and sound.
Online Projects
Many Museums and Cultural organizations are extending their curatorial and organizational projects to include the web as a context of presentation. These include:
- The new ARTPORT at the Whitney Museum of American Art.
- Artist Web Projects is curated by the DIA Center.
- Rhizome is the online project of The New Museum of Contemporary Art. The site includes Artbase an uncurated online archive of new media art containing more than 1500 works. They also present Rhizome exhibitions which are shows comprised of works from the ArtBase selected by invited net artists, curators, and writers.
- AdaWeb is a project of the Walker Art Center.
