jonCates -> New Media Education

jonCates NEW MEDIA EDUCATION...	NEW MEDIA PATH . DEV -> SCHOOL OF THE ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO -> FILM, VIDEO AND NEW MEDIA
	jonCates presents on the development of the New Media path of study as part of the Share Share Widely Conference on New Media Education @ NYU NYC NY .US on 2005.05.06 // MP3 # download an MP3 of the presentation // TXT # read a text transcript of the presentation: // ntro hello. i am jonCates + for the last 5 years i have been creating the curriculum of the New Media path of the Film Video and New Media department @ the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. i am very happy to participate in Share, Share Widely because the themes of this conference are urgent + intersect @ multiple points with the work that i do. // New Media path the New Media path i have developed in the Film Video and New Media department provides students with an innovative + playful course of study in New Media. i position New Media as hystorically rooted screen-[based/resistant] experimental media art. the New Media path establishes pedagogic precedents at the School + beyond. currently, the New Media path includes the following courses: New Media 01 (first offered Spring 2004), dotVideo (first offered SPRING 2000), Radical Software Critical Artware (first offered FALL 2001), playFull playMe (first offered in Fall 2004), realtime (to be offered FALL 2005), machinima (to be offered FALL 2005), OnEvent (to be offered SPRING 2006) + 0850LEET (to be offered in [2006/2007]). the New Media path, runs parallel to, intersects with + includes the hystories of Film Art + Video Art. emphasizing artware, video games, game art, machinima, realtime audio video systems + performances, web-based cinema, hypermedia, public programming + curatorial practice in the core curriculum differentiates New Media as a distinct but interrelated domain. // criticalartware in 2001 i created a course to investigate {code\|concept}-based approaches to experimental media art as software. this course, Radical Software Critical Artware draws comparisons between theorypractices of the [late 1960's/early 1970's] + today. By thinking through early phases of Video Art, Fluxus, Conceptual art + current software art or artware, the class actively discusses technological determination + utopian aspirations. hystorical overlaps, dissonance, leakages + integrations of these media art moments are articulated through screenings, readings + technological instruction. Radical Software Critical Artware is the first class of it's kind as a New Media studio art course with a practical hystorical approach to the slippery similarities + tentative disconnects between artware + Video Art. the collaborative criticalartware project was founded in 2002, after the core.developers met in the Radical Software Critical Artware class. students of the first Radical Software Critical Artware class desired to continue the discussions we began in the course + our continuance of those dialogues led to the development of criticalartware as a collaborative New Media hystory project. current core.developers jon.satrom + BenSyverson are both alumni of the School's BFA program + the Film Video and New Media Undergraduate curriculum. criticalartware has been internationally recognized for our commitment to the early Video Art moment in relation to the field of New Media, as well as our related attitudes + approaches to New Media hystories. artistically we have been recognized for our relentlessly playful attitude + approach, made visible in the forms we use to discuss, distribute + dismantle {code\|concept}-based experimental media art hystories. criticalartware is an example of a project that has grown out of the New Media path + now has a life of it's own independent of the School. criticalartware emerges from the New Media path's hystorical theorypractice orientation. this orientation binds conceptual frameworks, social constructs, political agendas + deviating displacements of the intended uses of systems. the New Media path arises from strong commitments to recognizing the precedents of hystorical interconnections, growing innovative + agile curriculum, analyzing + redefining obsolescence, implementing FOSS (Free + Open Source Software) systems + facilitating critical + productive discourses of + on New Media. students learn, in the New Media path of study, to enter New Media as a discourse, experiment with the terms of this discourse (i.e. aesthetics, formats, materials, etc) + play in the {social netork\|digital sandbox} of our collective 30+ year hystory. students learn to formulate their own versions of New Media + set ambitious goals based on the platform of their experiences. the hystorically rooted theorypractice model of Film Video and New Media allows us to prevent our curriculum from becoming brittle, overly trend driven, technologically determined [+/or] artificially obsoleted by external corporate imperatives or commercial change. the New Media path allows students to pursue the disciplinarity of the Film Video and New Media department but also functions as a method for students to plugin to these concerns from other areas. the School maintains an interdisciplinarity program that links departments in various ways. interdepartmentally within the School, i am pursuing other hystorical projects such as a class i created + am currently teaching, titled The Prehystories of New Media: 1965 to the Present. // The Prehystories of New Media: 1965 to the Present The Prehystories of New Media is the School of the Art Institute's first Art History, Theory + Criticism course on New Media. The Prehystories of New Media, offered for the first time in the SPRING 2005 semester, presents a series of inquiries + conversations about the origins of New Media. positioned as a prehystory, this course specifically describes the early moments of experimental + underground Film Art (of the 1960's) in relation to the development of what would later become known as Video Art (in the late 1960's + early 1970's) + the domain of New Media. these media art theorypractices are always discussed as situated in specific technosociopolitical contexts, such as countercultural activity in the United States as well as revolutionary struggles worldwide. in The Prehystories of New Media i present weavings of alternative structures that tie together interconnections + vasty tingleTangles of ideas + evidence in the manner described by Ted Nelson in his 1974 publication Computer Lib/Dream Machines. these art hystorical tracings of projects, works, events, actions + activities configure [multiple/parallel] prehystories. i discuss these sociopolitically embedded technologies in relation to the development of countercultures + continually arrived @ through contested, multiple, modular, subjective + personal hystories. i explicitly state these intentions + assumptions in my courseware + regularly express them in class as [seeds for further conversation/convolution kernels] for compiling discourse. // newMedia(now&&then) while creating the courseware + materials needed to teach this class, i have begun to blog a book that will be forthcoming from this process. i will self publish this book online + off as a shared cultural resource released under a Creative Commons license. the first elements of this project are currently available on my newMedia(now&&then) blog. // beginnings my impulses, motivations + playful experimentation with New Media forms + discourses link to the early formative moments of the Film Video and New Media department. through my research into the early Video Art moment, the scene in Chicago + the hystory of the development of the Film Video and New Media department, i map sum of these precedents + draw inspiration from this vital + ongoing hystory. in 1969 Phil Morton began teaching @ the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. One year later, in 1970, Phil Morton established the Video Area. the Video Area later become the Video Department + is now part of the Department of Film Video and New Media. Morton was a dynamic + charismatic artist who inspired his students to work enthusiastically with radical content, taught rigorous technical information + playfully developed convivial tools + conversational systems. i find his playful, experimental + innovative work to be inspirational + his strategies for bringing both analog + digital computing systems into the media arts curriculum foundational to the initial development of the Video Area + now the New Media path. Dan Sandin, who co-founded the Electronic Visualization Lab @ the University of Illinois Chicago, was also teaching + working with the new media of video as an art form in the late 1960’s + early 1970’s. between 1970 + 1973, Dan Sandin developed the Sandin Image Processor, a patch-programmable analog computer optimized for video processing + synthesis. when Sandin completed the I.P. in 1973, Phil Morton (who shared studio space in the same building as Sandin) sought to copy the [device/system] + they began to work together to create the schematic plans which they later called the "Distribution Religion". after completion of the Distribution Religion, Sandin open sourced the system, giving the plans to the emerging community + incorporating any [additions/modifications] into further releases. Phil Morton + Dan Sandin collaborated for mini years, initially creating the first copy of the Sandin Image Processor + the Distribution Religion + then mini realtime audio-video performance environments that utilized the Sandin Image Processor as well as other systems. // Old Skool Revolutionaries in 2003 i compiled a video program, called Old Skool Revolutionaries, that converses with these early moments of Video Art as a genre + the establishment of the Video department @ the School. the Video Area was the first department in the United States to offer a BA + MFA degree in Video Art. the people involved in the School’s community engaged with, analyzed, reflected on, built + disassembled the New Media of their time, playfully radicalizing + seriously institutionalizing toolsets, artworks + social systems. Old Skool Revolutionaries samples hystorical documents, lectures, discussions, individual artworks, collaborative events + performances as recorded in the archives of the Film Video and New Media department. Old Skool Revolutionaries literally transcodes, conceptually recalls + according to Fred Camper “captures the experimental spirit of the time by using contemporary scenes of the artists explaining their theories that have been altered with Sandin's "image processor," an analog device for manipulating video”. Old Skool Revolutionaries revisits moments from recordings of + projects by mini artists, academics + students, including Woody + Steina Vasulka, Jane Veeder, Gene Youngblood, Dan Sandin + the late Phil Morton. the current technosociopolitical context bears resemblances to the previous moments that Old Skool Revolutionaries [draws from/points towards]. valuable lessons emerge from those times, altered by the transcoding process but still vital to pedagogic considerations of New Media. New Media is a [feedback/feedforward] system of inter[relations/connections] between the discourses, activities + artworlds of Film, Video + New Media + must be understood + communicated as such to our students. // realtime in order to achieve these goals in the New Media path we offer courses that explore these networks of meaning. in the FALL 2005 semester i will introduce + teach realtime. realtime creates a platform for students to develop + play performative audio-video systems. students learn, play + perform with artware, open source tools + systems (i.e. PureData, GEM + dyne:bolic!) + commercially available software (i.e. Max/MSP + Jitter). realtime not only conceptually connects to the early moments i described previously but also literally reintegrates the Sandin Image Processor into the School's curriculum, confronting corporate imperatives + artificial obsolescence while reanimating the New Media discourse of these hystories + systems. // machinima in the FALL 2005 semester i will also introduce + teach another new course, machinima. machinima combines "machine" + "cinema" using computer-based video games to develop New Media art projects. machinima presents video games, game culture + game art in relation to Film Art + Video Art strategies. students play games, learn to render works in realtime with low cost, commercially available game engines as well as free + open source software systems, discuss online distribution + screen machinima projects. while other courses @ other institutions may discuss machinima in various but limited contexts, the machinima course in the New Media path of Film Video and New Media is dedicated exclusively to considerations of machinima as a New Media art form. // playFull playMe playFull playMe, first offered in Fall 2004, complements machinima + gives students the opportunity to develop playable game art + New Media projects. playFull, playMe considers computer based games as New Media artworks + art as a game-like system. students play, discuss + develop art games that share relationships to forms of gameplay such as text-based adventure games, first-person shooters, strategy games, simulators + conceptual games of chance. this advanced level studio course enables students to hack, modify + critique existing games + independently author games as New Media artworks. // OnEvent in the SPRING 2006 semester i will initiate + teach OnEvent. OnEvent fosters code-based approaches to public programming + curatorial practice. students curate, develop + organize collaborative, web-based + physical New Media arts events. New Media events will be discussed in relationship to the hystorical theorypractices of microcinema, underground film, alternative venues for experimental media arts, decentralized structures, network cultures + various forms of transient artistic cultural action. departmentally, OnEvent is part of the ongoing commitment + a wider effort in the SPRING 2006 semester to offer a range of courses that address public programming + curatorial practice for Film, Video + New Media artists. // 0850LEET furthest ahead in the New Media path is the introduction of 0850LEET, the first graduate level seminar on New Media. 0850LEET addresses obsolescence in relation to a hacker ethic + New Media art theorypractices. 0850LEET considers new uses of old, out-dated or forgotten technologies in relation to accessibility, available technologies + the creation of various elitisms. perspectives on technological continuums + their social constructions will be discussed + demonstrated. 0850LEET redefines newness, parses technopositivism, confronts the waking nightmare of Modernity, recontextualizes obsolescence + analyzes the fallacies of mastery as an aspect of artistic identity. // outro as i have developed the New Media path of study in the Film Video and New Media department @ the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, i have found that our unique attention to hystorical rootedness, conceptual frameworks, playful experimentation + radical cultural activity to be a healthy basis for New Media curricular developments + growth. deconstructing the [concept/construct] of newness, confronting ahystorical impulses to discard the past + flowing with the instabilities evoked by shifting genre formations + taxonomies present ever present problems. yet using these problematics as entryways to New Media allows engaged pedagogy + mobilizes micro-revolutionary potential in the classroom. i find in these humanist hopes + articulations my source of inspiration + commitment to the teaching of New Media + the development of the New Media path of study.