Image credit: Laura Splan, Baroque Bodies (Ambient Portals #1), 2022. Digital animation created with 3D nucleosome model and AI-generated image. 01:23 minutes. This work was made possible by the Simons Foundation. Created in collaboration with Adam Lamson, Science Collaborator and theoretical biophysicist at Flatiron Institute, a division of the Simons Foundation. ©2022 Laura Splan.

 

Art 12A is an introduction to the historical and theoretical foundations of digital media art and design. The course traces how information technologies informed the growth of new expressive mediums, and considers how today’s pervasive digital culture evolved through interdisciplinary collaborations between artists, engineers, scientists and scholars. The course considers a range of ideas, essays, artworks, technologies and other materials created by visual artists, computer scientists, scholars, writers, musicians, performing artists, interface designers, cultural critics, and individuals working across disciplines. Through lectures, assignments, and discussion, students will examine critical issues relevant to digital media and related cultural phenomenon and will develop an appreciation of how art-making practices have shaped—and been shaped by—trajectories of technological change.

Art 12A can be used to satisfy one General Education (GE) Requirement in Category IV, Arts and Humanities.

Art 12A can also be used to satisfy one Category A course in the Minor in Digital Arts offered by the Department of Art in the Claire Trevor School of the Arts.  

This special section of Art 12A will be focused on Future Tense: Art, Complexity, and Uncertainty at the Beall Center for Art + Technology.

 

 

OVERVIEW

Instructor: Jesse Colin Jackson

Teaching Assistant: Zachary Korol Gold

Time: Tuesday and Thursdays, 9:00AM—11:50AM

This course will have a hybrid delivery format. The first five sessions (8/6-8/20) will take place online, asynchronously, and will focus on foundational material. The last five sessions (8/22-9/5) will be in-person, and will feature opportunities that are only possible on-campus. The final exam (9/10) will be online.

Place: Online and ALP 2300

Office Hours: in general, please write us on Canvas or find us after class!

During the first five sessions we will host office hours online on Thursday 8/8 and 8/15, 10:00AM-10:50AM @ https://uci.zoom.us/j/2771603316    

 

REQUIREMENTS

The course consists of a combination of instructor and guest presentations, student submission of rhetorical and creative work, and a final exaam. In this course, students are required to:

  • Read and watch all online material
  • Attend all in-person classes 
  • Ask and submit questions
  • Visit an on-campus art exhibition 
  • Complete a multiple choice final exam

 

GRADING

The final grade will be based on:

  • On-time arrival to all in-person classes (15%).
  • Six questions directed at guest presentations (50%). 
  • Evidence of at least one visit to the art exhibition (10%). 
  • One final exam, focused on instructor presentations (25%). 

 

COURSE RESOURCES

All resources required for this course (e.g. readings, assignment descriptions, visual material) will be made available on this course website. Assignment submission and grading will occur via the course Canvas page.  

 

STUDENT SUPPORT

Please click here for a comprehensive list of campus student support services. Many thanks to professor Liz Glynn for compiling these resources.