Topics in Film Studies: Digital Media Art

Catalog description

This is a topics course. Course content varies. Prerequisite: one course in History of Art at the 100- or 200-level or permission of the instructor. Enrollment preference given to majors and minors in History of Art and Film Studies. This course was formerly numbered HART B334. Current topic description: D. N. Rodowick has argued that the digital arts "are the most radical instance yet of an old Cartesian dream: the best representations are the most immaterial ones because they seen to free the mind from the body and the world of substance." In this seminar, we will explore digital images in relation to cinema, photography, and other media. We will examine the fate of materiality, the body, and duration in 21st c. media, and consider whether or not the digital marks a significant break from the analog. Texts by Gilles Deleuze, Lev Manovich, Hito Steyerl, and others; works by Natalie Bookchin, Harun Farocki, Jacolby Satterwhite, and others.