Archives, Interviews, Experiments, and Data: Research Tactics for Contemporary Performance

Catalog description

This critical seminar and creative workshop will be dedicated to investigating the relationship between research methods and artistic practice. We will study the work of performing artists that engage in what are traditionally thought of as academic research modalities in order to collectively explore far-ranging questions about the political nature of both knowledge and art. How do artists acquire knowledge in order to critique inherited relationships between knowledge and power? How do artists research so as to think unthinkable thoughts? The course will be organized around four units spread across two semesters that are themselves organized around four different research methodologies and modalities: archives (archival research and historical analysis), interviews (ethnographic and documentarian methods), experiments (lab sciences), and data (machine learning and algorithmic knowledge). Each unit will ask students to engage in both critical inquiry and creative projects and will involve visits to specific research sites and institutions around the Greater New York City area. Open to Advanced Undergraduates (juniors and seniors). Design and Media Scenography Lab