Explores the theory and criticism of intersections between art, culture, and technology in relation to contemporary artistic practice, critical design, and media. Students consider methods of investigation, documentation, and display and explore modes of communication across disciplines. Students develop projects in which they organize research methods and goals, engage in production, cultivate a context for their practice, and explore how to compellingly communicate, display, and document their work. Regular presentation and peer-critique sessions, as well as reviews involving ACT faculty and fellows, and external guest reviewers provide students with ample feedback as their projects develop.

MIT Certificate Protected Syllabus

Series of tutorials that includes regular presentations of student writing in group critiques and supports independent thesis research and development by providing guidance on research strategy and written presentation. Sessions supplemented by regular individual conferences with thesis committee members.

MIT Certificate Protected Syllabus

Introduces foundational texts in contemporary theory and criticism at the intersection of art, culture, and technology. Through presentations and discussions, students explore the necessary methodological perspectives required of an interdisciplinary approach to artistic practices. 

MIT Certificate Protected Syllabus

9/4/24 - note change of scheduled days from TR to MW

4.356 U / 4.357 G

Explores ideas and contexts behind moving images through a multifaceted look at cinema's transmutations, emergence on local and national levels, and global migrations. Examines the transformation caused by online video, television, spatial installations, performances, dance, and many formats and portable devices, as well as the theory and context of film's categorization, dissemination, and analysis. Presentations, screenings, field trips, readings, visiting artists, and experimental transdisciplinary projects broaden the perception of present cinema. Additional work required of students taking the graduate version.

4.341 U / 4.342 G

Introduces history and contemporary practices in artistic photography through projects, lectures, artist visits, group discussions, readings, and field trips. Fosters visual literacy and aesthetic appreciation of photography/digital imaging, as well as critical awareness of how images in our culture are produced and constructed. Provides instruction in the fundamentals of different camera formats, film exposure and development, lighting, black and white darkroom printing, and digital imaging. Assignments allow for incorporation of a range of traditional and experimental techniques, development of technical skills, and personal exploration. Throughout the term, present and discuss projects in a critical forum. Additional work required of students taking the graduate version.

MIT Certificate Protected Syllabus Willis | Membreno-Canales

This course focuses on the production of artistic experiments catalyzed by research in art, with art and through art. Conceptually it deals with new modes of artistic production that shifts the discussion on artistic research towards critical engagement with the new climatic regime. Titled Climate Visions, the workshop positions artistic intelligence as a way to contribute with aesthetics and criticality to climate science, suggesting new visioning, that is in dialectics with scientific one. Oscillating between pragmatics and fiction this course will probe new perspectivism that enables future narratives of cohabitation with more-than-humans. The workshop will engage the MIT laboratories as a site where utopias for the future forms of environmental citizenship and new climate commons will be prototyped. In conversation with scientists the participants will develop hybrid projects of art and science suggesting an artistic instrumentarium for ecological repair, envisioning, speculation and probing of alternative perspectives, that catalyze a different climate for the future.

A multitude of concepts will be engaged with during this workshop: hybrid habitats and milieu, critical zones and new climatic regime, shadow biosphere and feminist fabulation, sympoiesis and composibility, cohabitation and commensality. Readings related to this subject include those by Bruno Latour, Donna Haraway, Anna Tsing, Gilbert Simondon, Catherine Malabou, James Lovelock, Michel Serres, Georges Canguilhem, Scott F Gilbert, Maria Puig de la Bellacasa, Andrew Pickering, Isabelle Stengers, Vinciane Despret, Eduardo Viveiro de Castro, Elizabeth Povinelli, Jakob Johann von Uexküll, TJ Demos, and others.

Visits to the class and the field trips may include Diane Borsato, Marjetica Potrč, Fernando García-Dory, Pelin Tan, Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg, D-Lab, MIT Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences.

The class is structured with the help of the three conceptual lenses through which participants will look into the artistic project: The Manifesto, The Score and The Instrument. As such these conceptual lenses would (A) connect with pressing concerns on climate crisis — making bridge between community / injustice / climate change, and (B) help to un-earth the underlying (autochthonous) landscape in the city, affected by an extractivist economy and colonization.

In addition to lectures, discussions, crits and individual studio meetings there will be visits to the labs organized facilitated by guest interlocutors, and designed to catalyze explorations and probe what “landing on Earth” (Latour) means in practical terms.

The class will meet as a group on Mondays 9:30 am – 12:30 am for main input: lectures, visits from guest artists, designers and scholars, and discussions of readings, with a Lab work scheduled on Wednesdays 9:30 am – 12:30 am, when individual meetings and/or studio visits and desk crits with the instructor (and guest artists) would be organized. Wednesdays time slot would also be reserved for workshopping of students' ideas, and/or library/archival research.

Students will engage in (3) phases and modalities of work: MANIFESTO, SCORE, and INSTRUMENT.

MIT Certificate Protected Syllabus

Seminar connecting the arts and sciences by exploring methodological similarities and differences across the arts, architecture, engineering, and social sciences. Through targeted reading and exercises, each student develops a collaborative project that engages directly with another discipline. Projects are iterated over the course of the term. Readings, visitors, and lectures expose students to a wide range of practitioners across different fields. Students interrogate the underlying methodologies that unite and separate their disciplines. Presents best-practice models for cultivating collaboration through the use of case studies. Additional work required of students taking the graduate version.

MIT Certificate Protected Syllabus

Note 5/17/24: schedule change from TR 2-5 to TR 9:30-12:30

4.314 U / 4.315 G

The Advanced Workshop in Artistic Practice and Transdisciplinary Research course series examines artistic practice as a form of critical inquiry and knowledge production. It offers opportunities to develop art as a means for addressing the social, cultural, and ecological underpinnings and consequences of technology, building bridges between industry and culture, and challenging the boundaries between public and private and human and non-human. It provides instruction in evaluating models of experimentation, individual research, and collaboration with other disciplines in the arts, culture, science, and technology.

Bioart is an interdisciplinary field that explores the intersection of art and biology, bridging the gap between science, technology, and artistic expression. This undergraduate and graduate-level course introduces students to the theoretical foundations, latest topics, and practical bio-art techniques, fostering creativity, critical thinking, and ethical considerations in creating bio-inspired artworks. Through theoretical discussions, hands-on art studio work, and guest lectures from experts in the field, students will gain a deep understanding of the historical context, ethical implications, and cutting-edge applications of bioart. The hands-on component includes developing artworks that utilize tissue printing, organs-on-chip microfluidic systems, bio robotics, DIY incubators, and liquid handling lab automation systems.

 Additional work required of students taking the graduate version.

MIT Certificate Protected Syllabus

5/16/24 - note schedule change from lecture W 2-5 to lecture T 2-5 and an added recitation, W 9:30-12:30.

Introduces artistic practice and critical visual thinking through three studio-based projects using different scales and media, for instance, "Body Extension," "Shaping Time," "Public Making," and/or "Networked Cultures." Each project concludes with a final presentation and critique. Students explore sculptural, architectural, performative artistic methods; video and sound art; site interventions and strategies for artistic engagement in the public realm. Lectures, screenings, guest presentations, field trips, readings, and debates supplement studio practice. Also introduces students to the historic, cultural, and environmental forces affecting both the development of an artistic vision and the reception of a work of art.

MIT Certificate protected syllabus