Undergraduate Overview

This course will introduce students to basic techniques of working with sound as an artistic material. As a prerequisite for many of the department's upper level offerings, the class is designed to familiarize the student with both the technology and the historical and aesthetic background relevant to our facilities and courses, to the field of 'sound art' and experimental music in general, and to the application of sound in other disciplines (video, film, performance, installations, etc.) Equipment covered will include microphones, mixers, analog and digital audio recorders, signal processors and analog synthesizers. Hard-disk based recording and editing (ProTools) is introduced, but the focus is on more traditional analog studio technology. The physics of sound will be a recurring subject.

Examples of music and sound art, created using similar technology to that in our studios, will be played or performed and discussed in class. The listening list will vary according to the instructors' preferences. Readings are similarly set according to the instructors' syllabus: some sections employ more or less reading than others, contact specific instructors for details.

Students are expected to use studio time to complete weekly assignments, which are designed to hone technical skills and, in most cases, foster artistic innovation. Some of these projects can incorporate outside resources (such as the student's own computers and recordings), but the emphasis is on mastering the studio.

This course will introduce students to basic techniques of working with sound as an artistic material. As a prerequisite for many of the department's upper level offerings, the class is designed to familiarize the student with both the technology and the historical and aesthetic background relevant to our facilities and courses, to the field of 'sound art' and experimental music in general, and to the application of sound in other disciplines (video, film, performance, installations, etc.) Equipment covered will include microphones, mixers, analog and digital audio recorders, signal processors and analog synthesizers. Hard-disk based recording and editing (ProTools) is introduced, but the focus is on more traditional analog studio technology. The physics of sound will be a recurring subject.

Examples of music and sound art, created using similar technology to that in our studios, will be played or performed and discussed in class. The listening list will vary according to the instructors' preferences. Readings are similarly set according to the instructors' syllabus: some sections employ more or less reading than others, contact specific instructors for details.

Students are expected to use studio time to complete weekly assignments, which are designed to hone technical skills and, in most cases, foster artistic innovation. Some of these projects can incorporate outside resources (such as the student's own computers and recordings), but the emphasis is on mastering the studio.

This course will introduce students to basic techniques of working with sound as an artistic material. As a prerequisite for many of the department's upper level offerings, the class is designed to familiarize the student with both the technology and the historical and aesthetic background relevant to our facilities and courses, to the field of 'sound art' and experimental music in general, and to the application of sound in other disciplines (video, film, performance, installations, etc.) Equipment covered will include microphones, mixers, analog and digital audio recorders, signal processors and analog synthesizers. Hard-disk based recording and editing (ProTools) is introduced, but the focus is on more traditional analog studio technology. The physics of sound will be a recurring subject.

Examples of music and sound art, created using similar technology to that in our studios, will be played or performed and discussed in class. The listening list will vary according to the instructors' preferences. Readings are similarly set according to the instructors' syllabus: some sections employ more or less reading than others, contact specific instructors for details.

Students are expected to use studio time to complete weekly assignments, which are designed to hone technical skills and, in most cases, foster artistic innovation. Some of these projects can incorporate outside resources (such as the student's own computers and recordings), but the emphasis is on mastering the studio.

A class to develop games and immersive media experiences that reflect your creative voice. Over 15 weeks, 'Intro to Games and Immersive Media' introduces a broad range of analog and digital game design techniques spanning from table top to virtual reality games. This course introduces students to game-making as a form of artistic practice, teaching foundational techniques and tools to develop analog and digital games that reflect their own creative voice and vision. No previous game-making skills are required, but students with an interest in games, or augmented and virtual reality technologies, will be guided through aesthetic and technical foundations in various aspects of game design and immersive media.
By the end of the semester, students will have created complete games or immersive media artworks ready to present in their portfolio.
Readings and screenings will vary but typically include Mary Flanagan, Eric
Zimmerman and Katie Salen Tekinbas.
Course work will vary but typically includes weekly reading responses, a mid-term, and a group final project. Students can expect to complete several exercises that explore a number of gaming media including working with game engines such as Unity or Unreal, character development and animation and motion capture. Students will complete a final culminating project in the form of a game or immersive media artwork.

This team-taught, introductory course provides a foundation for most additional coursework in the Art and Technology Studies department. Students are given a broad interdisciplinary grounding in the skills, concepts, and hands-on experiences they will need to engage the potentials of new technologies in art making. Every other week, a lecture and discussion group exposes students to concepts of electronic media, perception, inter-media composition, emerging venues, and other issues important to artists working with technologically based media. Students will attend a morning & afternoon section each day to gain hands-on experience with a variety of forms and techniques central to technologically-based art making.

This team-taught, introductory course provides a foundation for most additional coursework in the Art and Technology Studies department. Students are given a broad interdisciplinary grounding in the skills, concepts, and hands-on experiences they will need to engage the potentials of new technologies in art making. Every other week, a lecture and discussion group exposes students to concepts of electronic media, perception, inter-media composition, emerging venues, and other issues important to artists working with technologically based media. Students will attend a morning & afternoon section each day to gain hands-on experience with a variety of forms and techniques central to technologically-based art making.

This class will be an exploration of the electric light as an art medium. Through the demonstration of various electric light technologies the student will learn both the traditional use of lighting and installation and also an experimental approach to lighting that will produce unexpected visual effects. Students may work in individual or group projects that will span the range of light use from architectural design to performance as well as merging with other media such as sound.

Studio Techniques is an intermediate-level course that approaches the analog recording studio and its technologies as a creative environment for sound manipulation and exploration. Beginning with the sound sample as a material basis, the course combines a detailed approach to the fundamentals of acoustics and auditory perception with thorough instruction on analog signal processing and mixing. Students produce assigned and independent projects using these sample-based analog techniques. Topics are supplemented by listening exercises and examples of various artists? works to give historical and cultural context.

Topics in acoustics and auditory perception include sound localization, spatial characteristics of sound, frequency spectrum, and dynamics and loudness. Artists and musicians whose works serve as examples include Ruth White, Suzanne Ciani, Arthur Russell, Laraaji, Éliane Radigue, Laetitia Sonami, Trevor Wishart, and others.

Assigned projects include generating disparate sound materials from simple sources; composing sound/music works using self-generated samples and sources; live mixing/composing using analog technologies; independent projects using technologies and strategies introduced in the course content.

This course is offered for those students interested in developing skills in the creation and application of digital audio. Using Apple's Logic software, students interested in exploring sound or music are introduced to audio manipulation techniques that allow them to create soundtracks, to record and produce songs or dance tracks, realize abstract sound pieces or manipulate sound for installations.
Techniques of sound manipulation are introduced, including audio recording and editing, looping, and sound destruction. MIDI, drum programming, the use of software synthesis and basic music and composition techniques are addressed according to the needs of individual students.
The class is structured to encourage the interaction of students with a wide range of technical ability in audio from beginners to advanced artists in the early stages of a professional practice.

This is an intensive focus on the practice and theory of mixing audio and mastering final recordings. After making initial in-studio multi-track recordings, students will subject these to a careful examination of the creative and technical possibilities that attentive mixing can bring to a project. Mixing will be considered not just as means to a finished product, but as a crucial element of the aesthetic and conceptual process of making sonic art works. Analog, digital, and hybrid technologies will be utilized, with a focus on the parallels of analog gear and techniques and their digital emulations. Mixing for stereo output, multiple output, and other atypical situations will be covered, as well as special case applications, such as mixing and mastering for cinema soundtracks and installations.

With a concentration on creative practice in online environments, students will focus on the work of women, from the early days of computing, to the late 20th century, to the 21st century. In addition to lectures, readings, and traversals, practicum segments will guide student creation of online works that explore and expand on the role of women in cyberspace. Beginning with the work of women software engineers, such as black mathematician Katherine Johnson, engineer and transgender activist Lynn Conway, and Margaret Hamilton -- and with a project-oriented focus -- the course will look at the cyberspace-based work of women artist innovators, including ECHONYC founder, Stacy Horn; Cave Automatic Virtual Environment developer Carolina Cruz-Neira; and Ping Fu and Colleen Bushell's role in graphical interface design for Mosaic. At its core, the course will focus on the works of women cyberartists, including Joan Jonas, Sherrie Rabinowitz, Nancy Paterson, Brenda Laurel, Pamela Z, Char Davies, JR Carpenter, Lynn Hershman Leeson, Shu Lea Cheang, Tamiko Thiel, Carla Gannis, and Micha Cardenas. Students will create women-centered virtual art works, including graphic narratives and electronic manuscripts, and/or archives, online essays, or criticism.

Note that because Women Artists in Cyberspace is an asynchronous class, attendance on a specific day or time is not required.

As we adapt to the evolving demands of our politics and environment, we are often asked to prepare for a 'New Reality'. How are 'New Realities' imagined and formed? How can the act of imagining become a tool of creation?, This course will technically and conceptually explore what it means to create and simulate ?new realities? within game engines. As XR (extended reality) technologies such as virtual reality and augmented reality devices have become untethered, video game entertainment has become as ubiquitous as film, and user familiarity with the rhetoric of virtual worlds has become more common, this course will expose students to the many modalities in which game engines can be used to produce artwork.

Exploring histories of artists using digital media and simulation to produce interactive and highly immersive experiences, this course offers students technical guidance in creating artistic output from game engine tools, while learning from artist practices of that range from games, animation, simulation, to machinima (cinematic film captured from game engine worlds). With an emphasis on how interactive 3D worlds interact with our increasingly online and virtual routines, students will build projects that explore themes of participation, movement, behavior and world building to investigate our perceptions of ?reality?. The collected group of individuals in this class will act as an experimental lab of participants, collectively and individually pushing the boundaries between the virtual and the physical. Primarily working with the software Unity, this course will include technical demos, readings, and investigations into the histories of immersive media, machinima, and play as an artistic medium. Previous experience working with Unity recommended but not required.

Course work will vary but typically includes weekly reading responses, a mid term project, a final project as well as in class demos and workshops. Students may work collaboratively on these projects if they choose.

This class is intended for advanced undergraduates and graduates who are interested in the use of sound in an installation context. It is expected that students may come from a diverse set of backgrounds, and as such this course will be to some degree determined by the background of the students, and their specific needs. The course will include critical discussions of sound art and related installation and media art practices: a brief history of the sound/art interface, a brief introduction to acoustics, and readings by theorists and artists such as R.M. Schafer, Sterne, LaBelle, Cage, Lucier, Kahn, Lockwood, Fontana, Panhuysen, Lerman, Neuhaus, Monahan, Kim-Cohen, Kubitsch, Hellstrom, and Wollscheid. The topic of real-life sound installation exhibition and social context will also be covered, with input from the SAIC Exhibitions and Events Department. The course will also cover various methodologies for using/creating sound in installations through tutorials that are designed to give functional knowledge of each particular technique, as well as an introduction to the possibilities these techniques. Depending on the students? backgrounds and needs, potential topics for these tutorials include: basic sound recording and playback techniques, basic sound synthesis and electronics for audio, digital sound recording and editing, the fabrication of mechanical systems which create sound, using MAX (a visual MIDI programming language used for control and for processing audio), basic electronics for environmental sensing (sound, light, motion, etc.). In addition to working on various preliminary individual and collaborative projects during the semester, students will write a proposal for and present an installation as their final project.

DIY has become a widespread movement in the artistic community. Modifying, tinkering, tweaking and downright hijacking have become a commonplace practice among today's artists. Many everyday electronic objects are yearning to be liberated from their banal existences. This course explores readily available materials with a goal of bringing out the hidden aesthetic potentials of electronic devices. Students dig beneath the shiny surfaces to uncover underlying workings, principles and mechanisms. Class projects result in new artworks by reanimating the physical presences and behaviors of the reassembled artifact.

This course embraces the concept of projection as a broad field of art practice. Starting with the magic lantern, the course investigates the history of projection related practices that shape the parameters of visual perception and communication. Deconstructing the concept of the screen, the course focuses on projection in sculptural and installation contexts.

Microcontrollers and Adobe software is used in unorthodox ways to shape visual elements for digital light projection. History of visual, technical and conceptual use of light is accessed to investigate the interactions of projections with objects and space.

This course will provide an introduction to programming for sound synthesis and real-time performance using Max/MSP. Students will be taught how to use Max from the ground up with the following applications in mind: experimental music, sound & video installation, digital synthesis, signal processing, sonic & intermedia performance, music composition, and more. They will learn the basic structures, concepts, strategies, and vocabularies of Max in order to prepare them for using these techniques within other courses across various departments. It is expected that students will come into the class without any previous experience working with Max/MSP.

Constructing art objects that incorporate real or apparent motion often requires skills in a number of areas: physical shaping and fastening of elements, linking them to an actuator (such as a motor), and controlling the motion, most typically through electronics. This course will give students a grounding in all these techniques as well as initiate a discussion of some of the problems and possibilities inherent in the aesthetic use of motion.

This course explores language as something that moves, reacts, performs, and evolves¿behaving more like a generative system than a static text. Students investigate how language transforms when it encounters computation, emerging technologies, and inventive modes of engagement and presentation.

Drawing on more than half a century of experimental forms¿including computer poetry, hypertext fiction, digital poetry, text games, multimedia texts, algorithmic composition, and AI-driven systems¿students create autonomous, interactive, and immersive language-based works guided by weekly workshops. Projects may take the form of interactive or playable texts, responsive performances or installations, generative compositions, or hybrid works that invite participation, agency, and emergence.

Designed for broad accessibility, the course is anchored in web-based tools including HTML/CSS/JavaScript, p5.js, Twine, A-Frame, and contemporary AI language models, with optional extensions into interactive fiction platforms, expanded reality (XR), physical computing, and live systems. The semester culminates in a public event of readings, interactions, and performances. No prior programming experience is required.

This studio course investigates the creative possibilities in programming, from interactivity to information visualization. Students explore software art, generative systems, simulations and emergent behaviors, interactive narratives, and other code-based forms. Lectures and demonstrations provide a conceptual, aesthetic and technical foundation in programming as a creative practice. Techniques and concepts are presented through the open-source web-based creative coding library p5.js, along with an introduction to HTML, CSS and JavaScript. Midterm and final projects will build on in-class workshops, technical exercises, critical readings and discussions.

In this course we will focus on developing skills in the broad and dynamic field of Bioart. Students participate in classroom exercises and individual projects exploring the manipulation of living matter as artistic material. The course will cover basic protocols of molecular biology that will serve as departure points for study of more sophisticated and advanced techniques utilized by artists and scientists.

Readings will draw from numerous and varied sources. Students should expect to be willing to dive into such varied materials as essays on bioethics, podcasts on controversial bioarts, peer reviewed scientific journal articles, and online notebooks from well documented student biology projects.

Course work will vary but typically includes weekly reading responses, two short mid-term presentatinos, participation in class discussions and laboratory exercise, and the production of 1-2 finished pieces to be presented in a culminating course critique.