Material Code

with Samantha Bittman
FIBER 626 001 & PAINTING 603 001 | 3 credits
Online | June 14 - 27, 2024 | 10 a.m.- 12:30 p.m. CST

In this course, students will explore how the weave draft technique, often utilized by weavers for the loom, can generate patterned binary code which can then be translated into textile, painting, sound, and many other media. Focusing on the communicative capabilities of their chosen material, students will draft and manipulate algorithmic pattern generators to produce endless patterns of 1’s and 0’s. Works made by artists including Anni Albers, Xylor Jane, Beryl Korot, and kg will lead us into conversations around the origins of weaving, the loom, computers, and algorithmic art making. Discussion will be supplemented by Bhakti Ziek’s The Woven Pixel, Beverly Gordon’s “Cloth as Communication”, and Chris Ofili: Weaving Magic. Assignments will include drafting a “Sample Blanket” with graph paper, colored pencil, and other flat materials and, while contemplating how material choice makes meaning, final pieces of any media that utilize the code will be shared amongst the group.

Samantha Bittman is a visual artist and educator based in the Hudson Valley, NY. In her practice, she works with woven patterning to generate paintings, graphic wallpapers, and tiled installations. She has participated in residency programs at the Josef and Anni Albers Foundation, Sharpe-Walentas Studio Program, Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, Bemis Center for Contemporary Art, and Ox-Bow School of Art. In 2012, she received the Artadia Award. Recent solo exhibitions include, Ronchini, London, UK; Andrew Rafacz, Chicago; Morgan Lehman, New York; and Greenpoint Terminal Gallery, Brooklyn, New York. She has been included in numerous group exhibitions including David Castillo, Miami, Florida; Shane Campbell, Chicago; and Rhona Hoffman, Chicago. Her work has been written about in The New York Times, Wall Street International, and The Washington Post, amongst others. She has taught at numerous institutions Rhode Island School of Design, The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Tyler School of Art, Haystack School of Crafts, and Ox-Bow. In 2022, she founded Catskill Weaving School, an artist-run school that offers in-person and online weaving workshops, based in Catskill, and Brooklyn, New York. She holds an MFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and a BFA from Rhode Island School of Design.

Dreaming Community: Immersive 3D World Building in New Art City

with Hiba Ali
ART & TECH 606 001 | 3 credits
Online | June 28 - July 11, 2024 | 1 - 3:30 p.m. CST

Dreams have the ability to activate our imagination. In this class we start with dreams as an inspiration point, and translate them via a collective 3D collage in New Art City, a 3D interactive platform. Demonstrations will prepare students to use 3D objects, images, and soundscapes to create a collective dreamland. We will use software including Blender, GIFs, and Bandlab to build an immersive collective collage on New Art City. Inspired by the work of Tabitha Rezaire, Ruha Benjamin, and Mariame Kaba, in dreaming with community, we will create a digital portal of inspiration and activate our collective imagination. We will screen Tabitha Rezaire, Neema Githere, Merriam Bennani, Amina Ross, and Hito Steyer's video work and discuss them. We will read chapters from We Do This 'Til We Free Us: Abolitionist Organizing and Transforming Justice (2021) by Mariame Kaba, We "Viral Justice: How We Grow the World We Want (2022) by Ruha Benjamin and I Will Survive (2021) by Hito Steyerl. Assignments will invite students to locate their sense of comfort online, and arrange images, 3D objects and text, and sounds to translate those feelings into a space of virtual relaxation. Students will present a final project to the group. Students should supply a laptop with Blender software installed and create an account in New Art City (links will be provided upon enrollment). This class is open to students of all levels.

hiba ali is a producer of moving images, sounds, garments and words. they use principles of game design, 3d animation and immersive installations to create liminal spaces where they engage in world building, storytelling and digital poesis. in their practice, this term means a way to call forth more loving and healing into our world. they use virtual reality, 3d animation and augmented reality to slow down time and create portals of solace and care. they are an assistant professor at the college of design in the art & technology program at the university of oregon in eugene and they teach on decolonial, feminist, anti-racist frameworks in digital art pedagogies. their work has been presented in chicago, stockholm, vienna, berlin, toronto, new york, istanbul, são paulo, detroit, windsor, dubai, austin, vancouver, and portland.

Virtual Lyric Books

with Lee Blalock
ART & TECH 604 001 | 3 credits
Online | July 5 - 21, 2024 | 10 a.m. - 12:30 p.m. CST

As humans, we perpetually process a great deal of information from every direction, in every form, and often it isn’t kind enough to come in linearly, for easy digestion. Processing this noise doesn’t always happen in a thorough and organized manner. Instead, we often sample bubbles of thought that float between fiction and perceived reality. This course invites artists to explore practices that allow for bursts of thought using software and text. On our way to skill-based workshops, we will discuss contemporary media artists working with text, computation, and technology including Mendi + Keith Obadike, Allison Parrish, Nick Montfort, and Judd Morrissey. The generative poetry of early computer artists, excerpts from The Breakbeat Poets: New American Poetry in the Age of Hip-Hop, and the experimental text practices of different art movements will all supplement and inspire this class experience. We’ll look at art that marries text with technology and discuss how this affects how language is understood. Artists will create two works-in-progress that take cues from algorithmic techniques, song lyrics, combinatorial writing, and concrete poetry and receive hands-on experience placing these ideas in virtual environments using the game engine software Unity and code software p5.js. Students should provide their own computers and will be given access to the softwares.

Lee Blalock is a Chicago-based artist and educator presenting alternative and hyphenated states of being through technology-mediated processes. Interested in how technologies support the idea of impossible anatomies, behaviors, and performances, her work is an exercise in body modification by way of amplified behavior or "change-of-state". Lee’s interests include embodied cognition, anatomy and biomechanics, bionics, mechatronics, human/non-human entanglement, retro technology, and computational abstraction. She has presented work domestically, internationally, and virtually at many institutions including Feral File (online), Ars Electronica (online), the wrong biennale (online), NYU Abu Dhabi Art Gallery, Experimental Sound Studio (Chicago), ICA (Philadelphia), 205 Hudson Gallery (New York), and the Art Institute of Chicago. Lee is an Assistant Professor in the Art and Technology Studies / Sound Practices Department at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and practices various forms of embodiment as an everyday athlete.

Multi-Level Painting: Form, Process, and Meaning

with Josh Dihle
PAINTING 605 001 | 3 credits
Online | July 11 - 24, 2024 | 10 a.m. - 12:30 p.m. CST

This course for beginning to advanced students will include extensive experimentation with materials and techniques through individual painting problems. Emphasis will be placed on active decision-making to explore formal and material options as part of the painting process in relation to form and meaning. Students will pursue various interests in subject matter. Students may choose to work with oil-based media. Demonstrations, lectures and critiques will be included.

With a hand for detail and an eye on the natural world, Josh Dihle blends painting, carving, drawing, and sculpture to open visionary portals into the heart. He is the cofounder of experimental art/performance platforms Color Club and Barely Fair and teaches painting and drawing at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Dihle has had solo exhibitions at M+B (Los Angeles), Andrew Rafacz (Chicago), 4th Ward Project Space (Chicago), McAninch Arts Center (Chicago) and Valerie Carberry Gallery (Chicago). Dihle's work has been exhibited in group shows nationally and internationally, including MASSIMODECARLO Vspace (Milan, Italy), University of Maine Museum of Art (Bangor, Maine), Hyde Park Art Center (Chicago), Rover (Chicago), Elmhurst Art Museum (Elmhurst, Ilinois), IAM Gallery (New York), Flyweight Projects (New York), Essex Flowers Gallery (New York), Ruschman (Mexico City) and Annarumma Gallery (Naples, Italy). His work and curatorial projects have been written about in The New York Times, Chicago Tribune, New City, Artspace, The Washington Post, and Artsy, among others. Dihle lives and works in Chicago