Organization of Visual Studies working group (UCHI)

UCHI Faculty Fellowship

Art and Technology Working Group formation. Purpose of Workshops: The purpose of this workshop is to discuss recent scholarship on the intersection of art and technology, exploring to what extent have historical and contemporary developments in art emerged from and / or engaged with technologies, broadly defined: from writing and printing to photography and digital media. The lens of art and technology provides a way of moving beyond Eurocentric concepts of genius/spirit and naturalism/realism, while also looking towards paradigms of art related to technologically grounded epistemes. The workshop aims to bring together scholars from a variety of humanistic disciplines to discuss themes around art and technology from all historical periods and geographical regions. The selected readings combine transhistorical studies that explore theories of artistic techniques in relation to technologies across human history and artistic practices, with period-specific analyses associated with individual technologies, such as printing and artificial illumination. Potential outcomes:The workshop will bring together colleagues across a wide range of disciplines and from a wide range of perspectives and histories of technology and art to read and discuss a series of agreed upon books over the course of, at minimum, two academic years, during which time we will likely attract additional participants. The workshop aims to open a dialogue across departments regarding general theories within the historical study of the humanities around the themes of art and technology. At the same time, the workshop will create a context for discussion of original research being carried out by individual participants. In this way, the workshop will serve as a forum for sharing research questions and materials, and for encouraging interdisciplinarity.