Our collective piece for the Getty Blog has appeared!
Lots of info about our summer institute, the projects people have undertaken, and the continuing trajectory of our work together!
Decomposing the Disciplines at Jacobs University
On November 9, 2018 I had the distinct pleasure of returning to Jacobs University to present during a colloquium called “Bildung Beyond Boundaries, Part II: Beyond the Discipline. Academic Innovations and the Role of Inter and Trans Disciplinarity.” Duke has had a connection to Jacobs for number of years through the Visual Studies Initiative, and I have had the pleasure of serving on 3 PhD committees for students who were enrolled in the innovative VisComX PhD at Jacobs. My talk was called “How to Decompose Disciplines Best: Project Based Learning with Visualizing Cities.” I really liked the play on “decompose” – which in US English might have a slightly different association than it did for this international audience. As one does, I went back to the dictionary to think about decomposition in the form of a prism, which gave me an excellent opportunity to bring a rainbow into the conversation! I was also interviewed for a podcast about the subject. I really appreciate the international and committed community at Jacobs – a small place doing great things.
Contested Histories and Cultural Heritage at Ursinus College
At the invitation of Associate Dean Meredith Goldsmith, former FHI Fellow, I had the opportunity to visit Ursinus College in PA from October 30-31, where I spoke on “Contested Histories: Cultural Heritage and the Digital Archive” as well as conducted a workshop and got to meet a number of dedicated students. I had a wonderful time getting to know the campus and the curriculum. As a SLAC grad myself, I retain a special love of the liberal arts college environment.
As a bonus, I got to meet Kara McShane, a fellow alum of the Robbins Library and the Camelot Project at the University of Rochester, who is now a faculty member there! I credit Robbin Library curator and mentor, Arthurianist Alan Lupack, among others, with the opportunities to develop my digital interests in relation to the humanities way back in the 20th century! Though I’m no longer in an English Department myself, I continue to see a lot of digital innovation on both the teaching and research sides happening in them around the country.
“Origins + Journeys” Online exhibition debuts at SIGGRAPH 2018
This year the Digital Arts Community partnered with the SIGGRAPH Art Gallery to create an online exhibition, “Origins+Journeys,” that extends the conversation of the physical exhibition. I worked with curator Andres Burbano to create a call for proposals and the DAC team worked with the artists to create a juried online exhibition that could be viewed both from individual computers and from a kiosk set up in the Art Gallery itself. Very excited about this connection and look forward to new ways of extending our Digital Arts community virtually!
Parameters Essay
I wrote an essay for Parameters: Knowledge Under Digital Conditions, which is published by the Social Science Research Council, on the topic of “Knowledge in 3D: How 3D data visualization is reshaping our world” – it was fun to think about how to distill some general thoughts for this context.
Fall 2018 Teaching
This Fall I will be teaching two courses:
- ISS 240/VMS 288/AMI 325: Web-Based Multimedia Communications, which we are offering in a hybrid online lecture and live section format for the first time. (I will be doing the lecture parts and coordinating the sections). This course fulfills the Practice component of the Visual and Media Studies BA in Art, Art History & Visual Studies as well as for the Information Science + Studies Certificate.
- HCVIS 580S/VMS 580S/CMAC 580S: Proseminar 1: Historical and Cultural Visualization for our MA in Digital Art History/Computational Media.
I will also continue the Digital Durham and NC Jukebox Bass Connections projects, focusing on the updating and development of our archives websites and derivative cultural heritage apps, as well as helping out on the related collaborative Building Duke project with the Wired Lab. I may take on a few students interested in working on these projects as part of an independent study or as volunteers, with an emphasis on archival research and development of digital assets.
Psychasthenia Studio and the Gamification of Contemporary Culture
Yay! My essay about gamification and my longstanding collaboration with Joyce Rudinsky in Psychasthenia Studio is now online! Take a look in Media and Communication!
Wrap-Up of the DAH Venice 2018 Summer Institute
We just finished up the Advanced Topics in Digital Art History: 3D Geospatial Networks Institute in Venice! Sponsored by the Getty Foundation and undertaken in collaboration with the University of Padua and Venice International University, we came together to talk about how DAH advances both Art History and transforms it. What an amazing group of collaborators – I’m thrilled to be able to continue to work with them over the course of the next year.
The Wired Lab captured our Tweets during the Institute and we’ll be posting blog updates and reflections from our participants soon. The whole experience was truly energizing and exciting!
For more info, see http://dahvenice2018.org
Apprehending the Past: Augmented Reality, Archives, and Cultural Memory
My essay, “Apprehending the Past: Augmented Reality, Archives, and Cultural Memory,” written for the Routledge Companion to Media Studies and the Digital Humanities, edited by the heroic Jentery Sayers, is now out. Truly in exalted company! If only it weren’t quite so expensive – at least there is a semi-affordable e-version. I can’t wait to dig into everyone’s contributions.
Executive Committee of the Academic Council
Well, I’ve been elected to ECAC – the Executive Committee of the Academic Council – for a two year term. I’m honored to participate in faculty governance in this way – it is going to be a lot of work, but also quite rewarding and interesting to learn more about how the university operates! A bit of a switch from being on the other side of the presentations for our MA and PhD programs…
