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Syllabus


Course Description
Creating Context and Collaborative Practice focuses on the many thrilling opportunities for artistic and collaborative practices rooted outside of traditional venues – outside of the gallery, far afield of the museum – potentially off-grid, even ephemeral and impossible to document. The course will hone in on key case studies of media art, digital and internet-based practice, rhetorical software, and computational art practices that stress a collaborative and cooperative ethos. Together, the students will be encouraged to look closely at the already extant collaborative elements in their own respective practices, while, at each step, both considering and defining an elusive, fraught word – context – for themselves. 

Together, students will learn to generate context by learning from radical, generative curatorial artists’ practices over the past seventy years to the present moment. They will together dive into the most impactful historical (and ongoing) artistic initiatives, specifically those that endeavor to create context for new artistic practices. In study of these practices, discussion and debate, they will essay to tackle these questions:

What do we consider the context for our artmaking?

How do we discover and deduce context?

How do we learn to collaborate and towards what end? How do we learn to think together, in face of contradictions and radical differences in opinion, politics, perspectives, and approach?

How do we identify contexts that existed before we step into a room, specifically that of an art space?

What contexts are needed at this moment and why?

Who is the public we imagine for our work?

The first third of the course is dedicated to study. In the second tranche, students will start to conceptualize and develop a public-facing event, considering position, argument, place, and content, considering many possibilities to subvert traditional exhibition strategies. In the final weeks, the students will work together to produce this public facing event, which will take place in the final week of the course, and in the form, style, and fashion collectively decided upon.

Curriculum Details: Each week, the on-campus studio component of this seminar course runs three hours each Monday. Outside study generally constitutes six hours. The course can be repeated for credit.

Learning Objectives


Students will leave the Creating Context and Collaborative Practice studio with:

1. An awareness and knowledge of contemporary collaborative arts and media art practices;
2. An understanding of the requirements for developing and staging a collaborative event;
3. New ideas for how art and artists can function in the world beyond the gallery;
4. And invaluable skills in critical writing, research, collaboration, and production of a large-scale event.

Required Readings

Essays or excerpts, when assigned, will be weekly posted to the Course Readings Folder. Additional readings will be shared and read together in class.


Course Materials

This Course Website: https://ccacpdma.persona.co/ (Bookmark!)
Class Google Drive
Course Readings Folder in Class Drive


Assignments

1. Writing Prompt #1 | 500 words | 10% of Grade | Due Week 2

2. Writing Prompt #2 | 500 words | 10% of Grade | Due Week 3

3. Writing Prompt #3 | 500 words | 10% of Grade | Due Week 4

Weekly writing prompts are designed to develop and solicit ideas on alternative and expanded modesof practice, along with response to in-class lectures, reading, and discussions.


4. Final Event | 60 % of Grade | Due Week 10

Contribution to the development and production of a collaborative event.

5. Participation + Attendance | 10% of Grade | Weekly

This is a graduate seminar. The expectation is that participants will attend each session, engage with the class materials, and contribute to a vibrant discussion.

Grading Breakdown

  • Writing Prompt #1: 10%

  • Writing Prompt #2: 10%

  • Writing Prompt #3: 10%

  • Participation in Final Event: 60%

  • Participation + Attendance: 10%



UCLA Course Requirements and Assessment Rubric:


Participation: For participation, it is absolutely vital that you take actively part in the discussions in class. Our work in this class is to build a community, of investment in each other. It takes each person’s interest and expertise into account, and allows us to get to know one another and create an ongoing dialogue. Your speaking in class, your participation, is essential, of course, for a dialogue. The group depends on your contributions. 


Attendance Policy: Attendance is crucial. There are no more than two absences allowed with exceptions for major emergencies and/or medical issues. You cannot pass the course with more absences. Any unexcused absences will lower the final grade by one letter grade. Please communicate with your faculty often and early; please give me far advanced notice for any absence. Two or more unexcused absences are grounds for removal from this course by the registrar. Late attendance without advanced notice affects attendance and one’s grade. Please consider your peers’ time, and your faculty’s time.


Academic Code of Conduct: Student work is expected to follow UCLA’S Academic Code of Conduct. Please see https://deanofstudents.ucla.edu/student-conduct-code for more information.


Diversity and Inclusion: The UCLA community is dedicated to the advancement of knowledge and the development of integrity. In order to thrive and excel, this community must preserve the freedom of thought and expression of all its members. A culture of respect that honors the rights, safety, dignity, and worth of every individual is essential to preserve such freedom. We affirm our respect for the rights and well- being of all members.

Statement on Plagiarism: Plagiarism attacks the freedom and integrity of thought. In a class that will depend to some extent on online research, you must know what constitutes plagiarism and avoid it.  The UCLA academic statement and policy are articulated here: https://deanofstudents.ucla.edu/academic-integrity