What is digital imaging?

One of the big questions I face on a regular basis is if chemistry photography is "dead" now that we have digital photography. My short answer is that they still make stuff out of the earth, don't they? If ceramics has existed and survived for centuries despite the development of newer technologies, surely photography's roughly 150 year run could last a little bit longer?

But this leads me to another question. Is digital photography simply the newest technology of photography, or is it actually a new medium?

In many ways the advent of digital imaging mirrors that of chemistry photography. Photography as we know it was invented in the 1830's when Louis Daguerre developed the ability to produce a lasting image from light sensitive materials in a relatively short period of time (minutes instead of hours as Niepce had done in the 1820's).

The invention of photography forever changed the way we looked at the recording of images and likenesses. In 1800 if you wanted your portrait, you had it painted or rendered in some way by hand. But by 1850 if you wanted a portrait, you had a choice. And this choice changed not only our relationship to photography, but also to painting. Painting had been the means by which we recorded the world around us, now painting was "liberated" from the task of simply recording reality.

This is not to say that this was a conscious choice at the time, but if you look at painting styles between 1850 and 1950 you will see a definite progression away from faithful recording to interpretive and expressive image making. In other words, photography created a choice for painting to be about something else besides "recording."

But early photography also had a problem. A problem of taxonomy. What was photography? What was its role? Photography was not really seen by most as a fine art in the 19th century. Those who attempted this usually did so by mimicking an existing medium, painting, to give it credibility. Ironically, it was the characteristics that made photography unique - the sharpness, the ability to accurately record - that kept the medium from being embraced as something "creative."

It wasn't until the Soviet Avant Garde movement of the early 20th century that photography was appreciated for it's unique aesthetic and technical abilities. The optical lens can see and record space with a different depth and film exposure can treat light in a unique way. Only then, some argue, did photography come into it's own as a medium.

What then is unique to digital imaging? Are we treating this medium to the standards of another? I argue that we have culled digital imaging to mimic photography. Digital images are comprised of pixels and yet we shun images that are "pixely." Is digital imaging following in the path of chemistry photography? First emulating another medium and slowly coming into its own?

Digital imaging is fundamentally different than chemistry photography because the capture method has changed. Throughout what Martin Lister would call the "short history of photography" the technology has changed but the capture process has always remained the same. That is to say that it was always a chemical process utilizing light sensitive silver. But digital imaging is an electronic process in which light waves are converted to binary data (this is a super-simplified explanation of course). Right now the goal with digital images is to emulate film photography but it doesn't have to be so. As the design group Eboy says, "Pixels are beautiful."

image credit: mnsc

Prague!

Hello everyone, I'm back from my trip to Prague and Knoxville. While Knoxville was beautiful I didn't really take that many photos, but I did take quite a few in Prague. Here's a bit of what I saw:

Hope you enjoy them!

Greetings from Prague!

That's right I'm traveling again for another conference. This time it's a double header. Right now I'm in Prague at the Academy of Fine Arts (pictured) for a conference entitled The Aesthetic Dimension of Visual Culture. I'll be presenting this afternoon. My topic is The Digital Image in Art: Defining the Digital Aesthetic and my argument is that digital imaging is essentially separate from photography despite the current similarities.
After that, I leave early tomorrow morning and fly to Knoxville, TN for another conference entitled ASAP/1: Arts of the Present where I will be giving a talk entitled Social Media and Art on Friday morning. So it is a busy few days!
Once I have rested and recuperated from all of my travels I will post some of my presentations here to you share with you.
Prague has been fun but cold. So while I'll miss it, I'm looking forward to the warmer weather in Tennessee!

Greetings from Tuscaloosa!

I'm at the University of Alabama for the 31st Association for Integrative Studies Conference. This year's theme is Creativity and Play Across the Disciplines and I am here to yet again convince the masses that social media can be a valuable tool for successful exposure and promotion in the 21st century.

The conference has been really great so far – I got a lot of great feedback from my presentation and I’ve heard a lot of great ideas revolving around creativity and education. I was also reminded of Sir Ken Robinson’s talk Does Education Kill Creativity? If you haven’t yet seen it, I encourage you to look for it online as it is quite revealing.

I have to drive back tomorrow and I’m almost sorry to see this end – AIS is always a great conference. Next year’s theme is sustainability and I already have an idea…

Bad Liz (*slaps hand*)

Dear blog and blog readers,

I have not abandoned you despite all evidence to the contrary. Actually I believe I am suffering from what the people-who-speak-English-with-a-French-accent would call "Le writer's block." And I do have something you could help me with.

I have been attempting to write an alternative bio for myself (alternative in style, not facts). And I need some help getting started. So while this is scary to put out on the internet, I have to ask, "Hey internet, what am I like?"

Any suggestions, attributes or qualities (please no snarkyness here, email me if you want to get personal) will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

(And I promise to post again soon!)

Here I go again!

I'm off again! This time I'm leaving for Cornwall, UK to attend and present in the Image 2.0 Digital Media Futures conference at University College Falmouth. I will be presenting a paper entitled "Web 2.0 and Creativity." The conference will take place at the Tremough campus, pictured above. Wish me luck with my travel - it's going to be a long trip!

Denmark!

I just got back from Denmark where I was giving a presentation on my video series Let Us Praise Famous Men in the conference Transcultural Montage by the University of Aarhus and the Moesgaard Museum.

Here are some images from Denmark:

America's second favorite pastime

So twice in the last 48 hours I've been told that I have an "interest in copyright." Ok, so maybe that's true that I do have some interest and maybe that's because on some level it's linked to my field, but shouldn't everyone be interested in copyright? It's not as though the laws don't apply to those who aren't "interested." Copyright laws are more important than ever and awareness is really important right now. The laws are a lot more aggressive and restrictive than they once were.
Case in point, my new box set of The State DVDs (loved that show, check it out if you've never heard of it). The back of the box set includes a disclaimer stating that they had to replace a lot of the music they used in the original episodes because they didn't have the rights. This show wasn't fly-by-night, it was on MTV. If the music was legal in the 90s why isn't it legal now? What's changed? Copyright laws. (The same thing happened with the tv show WKRP).
So don't think awareness of copyright is an option. This kind of reminds me of email in the 90s. Remember when people would just say "Oh I don't use email" and that was a legitimate excuse? No more. The same is true for copyright. The laws are becoming more pervasive and more aggressive and you might be violating something that you never even knew could be illegal. So don't be scared, get on teh interwebs and "google" copyright today.

(And if you're really stuck for where to start, come to a CopyNight event, also hosted by yours truly)

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Awesome photo thanks to 917press

More importance of being....

Well the conference is wrapping up now and I have a few more bits of reflection on presentations to add to my original list:

1. Warnings. I was in a presentation that was generally benign when suddenly I was confronted with images of a decapitated sheep's head in a vice. If you are going to show this, especially when jumping from "innocent" images, it might be a good idea to warn people.

2. Know your technology and do a practice run if possible. Have a video? Play it ahead of time so you know if the audio is wonky or that it won't run without a certain player. Too many minutes were lost in presentations over fudging with technology. In this conference it was fairly easy to get into the presentation spaces ahead of time and make sure everything will run. But even when that's not the case, stick to something you know will work, have a backup plan or even just try to use your own laptop if possible.

3. Do not read your powerpoint. I would hope most people would have something to add besides the few words they have included in their powerpoint. If not, you either don't have enough content or you've loaded your powerpoint with far too much information. Plus I feel like a kindergardener having a book read to me by the teacher - I can read thank you very much.

4. Language. This one is a bit sensitive, but make sure you can converse in the language in which you will be expected to present. If not, make some arrangements. It's very frustrating to not understand something that sounds as though it might be very interesting, but I just can't get to it.

5. Move the pointer! This one might be an issue of minutia but I cannot stand when someone clicks on something either in powerpoint or a video and then leaves the cursor in the middle of the screen. It's quite distracting to see this little finger icon or an arrow when I am trying to focus on whatever it is you are showing.

So that's it for now. I'll have radio silence until I get to London sometime tomorrow afternoon. Oh and by the way, my presentation went well and I am proud to say I did none of the mentioned offenses. But I do have one more don't that I know I am guilty of: stop saying "um." (Any suggestions for me on that one?)

The importance of being...

Years ago at the first conference in which I presented, I was was scheduled to go in the first panel. While this was nerve-racking, it did free me to relax and enjoy the rest of the conference. At this conference, I am scheduled to present on the last day, in the last session. While on the one hand this is extending the nervousness, I also have an opportunity to see a lot of other's presentations while thinking about how to refine my own. And here's what I've discovered. When thinking about your presentation it is important to:

1. keep it simple. Case in point, the graph I snuck a photo of. This was not the most complex of this presenter's slides, but he was too quick for me to snap a shot of the busiest slide. This was exacerbated by him not explaining these graphs and after a few, I just sort of stopped trying to read all the little red text on black.

2. stay on topic. If you show me images or video, talk about those images and video. If you seem to be talking on a completely different subject than your visual aids, and don't offer any way of telling us how they are connected, I am just going to tune out and just focus one or the other.

3. practice. Each session is two hours long and has about 4-5 presenters. So that's about 15-20 minutes per person. So practice what you are going to say ahead of time. With a watch. See how long it takes you. Many presenters went well over their alloted time with the clever strategy of looking down at their paper or focusing on the screen to avoid the time monitor's indicators of just a few minutes remaining. Not only will practice help you to know how long to talk, it will also help you to be less nervous and appear more organized - this will also save you time.

I've heard a lot of interesting concepts, theories and work in this conference so far. But very often I was distracted to the point that I almost missed it. And while I'm nervous to go last, after another day and a half of these presentations, hopefully I can refine my own presentation learning from what does and doesn't work in the others.

Overall, this is a really great conference. (And tonight I have my first real British pub experience!)

(insert British colloquialism here)

Greetings from England! I'm attending and presenting in the International Visual Sociology Association conference on the campus of the University of Cumbria in Carlisle England. The conference has only just begun and I've just come from the keynote address by a very interesting man named Howard Hull. Luckily my presentation is on the third day so I have plenty of time to acclimate to the local time (I'm a bit sleepy at the moment). We had a bit of an internet problem but I seem to be one of the lucky few who could get their mac laptops to connect to the wireless. This conference seems very promising, so more to come as possible (hopefully the internet continues to work). The image above is the Learning Gateway, a very nice facility in which the conference is being held.

Taking calculated risks

I've never considered myself much of a gambler. I'll proudly take my place with the low stakes gamblers at the nickel slots in any casino. But I've come to realize that I do have a bit of a risk taking streak after all.

Now this isn't pity party for Liz, "I used to have to walk uphill in the snow both ways" talk or anything, but I didn't really come from any kind of background that would support going to college, much less to major in Art. In most parents' minds, an Art major is right up there with Philosophy or Women's Studies (no offense!) in terms of future job prospects. Whenever I have to meet with prospective stuents' parents the dreaded, "how will my child ever survive" question invariably always comes up. Luckily my parents were cool enough to let me do the only thing I was ever really interested in doing.

So not only was this the case with undergrad, but when I set my sites on a private art school for my graduate studies, the tuition was a serious inhibitor. But I thought about it. How long would to take me without a graduate degree to earn enough money to pay for tuition? And then how much higher would my salary be with a terminal degree? With a much higher salary I could pay back my tuition must faster than I could ever save it up. So I took out loans, mostly fed but a few private, and I went to grad school. I had a good experience, I learned a lot about art and I got into teaching straight out of grad school. I wouldn't be where I am now if I hadn't taken the risk of student loans and I'm happy I took that risk.

And now (not to brag, I swear) I have many opportunities to present both my artwork and my research at conferences and exhibitions all over the world. Sure, my university does have some support for this, but not really enough to cover the cost of traveling to everything - I have eight or nine trips I scheduled for just this year alone. Very often I have heard faculty lament about not going to a conference because the university wouldn't cover the costs. But isn't this, as the saying goes, cutting off one's nose to spite their face? Can you just imagine someone's resume or tenure portfolio listing all the prestigious conferences they were "invited" to but did not intend? All the grant proposals they developed but never completed because they couldn't get any money? Good luck with that. The truth is that while it is great if your university can support you, very often they can't and it's no excuse to not produce and become an important and relevant scholar in your field.

I'm footing the bill for several trips to Europe this year. This all while paying off those aforementioned student loans. But I don't mind, I'm not panicked. Again, the benefits versus the cost make this a calculated risk. I love what I do. I love to make art and I love to teach art. Having the ability to be a keynote speaker, or share my artwork and my teaching philosophy and to make a name for myself in my field are all worth the cost of a plane ticket. It makes me a better artist and scholar, not to mention really boosting my frequent flyer points!

Too often I hear from students who are getting ready to graduate or who have just graduated that they thought about grad school but that it was too expensive so instead they are going to work a while and then go. I know what I'm going to say is a horrible sweeping generalization, but I think for many of these students that is a mistake. Unfortunately, there's not much one can do these days with just a BA. I worry about those students. I wonder if they'll ever go back to making art. Often times they don't. Many students come back a year or two after they've graduated frustrated that they haven't made artwork since school.

So whatever your goal is, grad school, a conference in Prague, or whatever, you should ask yourself, "is this really out of reach?" My mom tells me sometimes that I'm lucky to have achieved everything that I have. But I have realized that it wasn't so much that I was lucky as that I was stubborn. I knew what I wanted, and I didn't stop until I found a way to get it. What do you want? Are you going to go after it or wait and see if it comes to you?

Image by MarkyBon

I'm back!

3,616 images and 2683.9 miles later I'm home. It was a really good trip overall and I got a lot of great images for my series. I even covered more area than I had anticipated I could cover. Now all I have left is West Palm Beach through Key West which I will hopefully be able to complete later this year. You can see some of what I shot here. Now, time to catch up on a month's worth of work!

A reoccurring theme...

So I've managed to shoot the two regions I set out to shoot and even got in a bonus third region on this trip. I didn't know what I would find here - it turns out there's not a lot left or what I thought might be here - but this is a documentary project so I'm here to document what I see and what is. And it turns out that there is a reoccurring theme along this highway and throughout a lot of Florida (and probably a lot of America right now) and that theme is property. There is property everywhere. New properties, old properties, abandoned properties, new and vacant properties, torn down lots that were never rebuilt upon. There is an excess of space. But there is no one to use it.

In my series I photographed the empty lot that used to be the Daytona Bowl. I know it was the Daytona Bowl because I remember skipping class one afternoon to go there with a friend in high school. I had never been bowling before and it seemed like an odd way to spend a skip day but I found out I was fairly decent at the sport that day.

The Daytona Bowl lot was purchased in 2004 and torn down in preparation for a condominium that was never built. Now the empty lot is up for sale. There are a lot of things in Daytona that were torn down in the real estate boom that were never replaced. And I can't help but think as I drive by them that if only they hadn't been torn down in the first place we could still be bowling or playing skee ball at the boardwalk, or who knows what.

How long can we as a society continue to expand? Is new always better? Is old always bad?

Scooters and Golf Carts - the generation gap

A few days back I took a little side trip to test out another photo series I have in mind.

Basically there is this retirement community called The Villages for the 55+ crowd in north central Florida were my grandmother lives. It happens to be exactly one hour south of Gainesville, FL which is where the University of Florida is located and which you could say caters to the 18-24 crowd.

Each of these locations has a skewed demographic, but I have found some interesting similarities between the two towns. This is the first diptych that I wanted to do for this series. Anyone who is anyone at The Villages has their own golf cart and in the last few years scooters have taken over at UF.

What do you think of my image and the idea?

1324...

...photos shot so far. And here are a few of them.

Radio Silence

It's officially summer break for classes (although my online summer class starts next Monday - sheesh) and I am leaving tomorrow for a one month photo shoot in FL.

I'm pretty excited about the project - I'll be documenting the "disappearing tourist culture" along US 1 - but it'll keep me pretty busy for the next month or so.  I do plan on posting when I can, but if you don't see a new post for a while, have no fear, I will return soon.  For now, wish me luck that I get to FL intact with all my gear!  I'll leave you with this vintage photo of the Daytona Beach boardwalk that has been pretty much all but been torn down now. 

Everyone is someone's difficult person

I was doing some end of the term office cleaning today and I came across some notes I took during my mediator training.  (I'm a mediator, did you know that?)  On my notes was the statement "everyone is someone's difficult person."

My first thought was "Yikes! Surely not me."  But probably yeah, I'm someone's person, just as we all are someone's difficult person.

So what can we do about this?  For me, it makes me remember that as I would hope someone would have patience with my idiosyncrasies, I too should have patience for those who I feel are "difficult."  We are not always aware of the effect we have on others, and sometimes we're simply just not compatible with everyone else.  But losing one's temper, starting arguments or "wars" will never really work because someone being described as "good," "bad," "nice," "difficult," etc. is all subjective and while most people find me to be a rather agreeable person, I'm sure there's someone out there who feels that I'm their difficult person. 

Are you someone's difficult person?  What can you do today to become more tolerant of your difficult person?

Technology is a tool

I got in a car accident this morning.  Nothing serious, in fact after everything was over there wasn’t even any damage and the officer wouldn’t take a report.  But at the time I didn't know what had happened, so as she "fled the scene," I followed her (at a safe distance) and called 911.  It took a bit of time for the dispatcher to figure out where I was located because I didn’t really know the name of any cross streets.

After this was all over I called my husband to tell him everything.  I even mentioned my inability to remember any of the street names.  I said to him, “I don’t the names of the streets, I just know how to drive on them.”  And that’s when it hit me - this attitude mimics the way we should look at technology.

I have always said there were two kinds of photographers.  Those who were interested in the images they produced and those who I like to call the “Tan-Vesters.”  Sure, there are times I’ve been shooting when I wouldn’t mind having one of those things, but this isn’t so much about the vest as it is about the attitude towards photography or really any creative medium.

A few years ago I attended an artist talk by a photographer named Lex Thompson.  Lex’s photographs are an interesting, unblinking look at the detritus we leave in our quest for happiness.  After his compelling talk outlining the concepts behind his work he asked for questions and the first one he received was which filter did he use on a slide three slides back?  I could remember thinking, “Seriously? That’s all you got out of all of this?”  That person, my friends, was a tan-vester.  Someone who gets so caught up on the tools that they forget to see the big picture.

Now this doesn’t mean we should all go willy-nilly into using technology without knowing what we’re doing.  But we should remember that technology is only a tool and not an end in itself.  I had a student who approached me asking to do an independent study.  His proposal was that he wanted to learn everything about the program Flash, but wasn’t interested in making anything.  I asked him what the point was then?  How could anyone fully appreciate what he or she was learning without the framework of producing something from what they found?  I told him it would be like “learning how to use a pencil, without ever making a mark.”  Needless to say, that independent study course never happened.

Technology is a tool.  Whether it’s a new camera lens, a software program, a pencil or even our hands, the point should always be in how they are used, as knowledge of them is no end in itself.  The girl who hit me in her car this morning might have known the name of the road we were on, but it sure didn’t make her a good driver.

Is cheating really a skill?

While the details have become vague, I remember getting in trouble for cheating during a spelling test in the second grade. I don’t remember the word, but I apparently “looked up” the word somewhere during the test. Perhaps I was a neurotic second grader, but I really felt bad about “cheating,” but at the same time I felt compelled to find an answer for that test, which I did.

It’s been a years since I thought of this test. But for some reason it came to my mind the other day. And then I remembered this quote by Einstein, "Never commit to your memory what you can find in a book." How many of us have everything we know truly tucked up into our brains at all times? I don’t know about you but I usually have to do some research and refresh on details and facts before I talk or present on a topic. Is that “cheating?”

On a regular basis we are now surrounded by technology and our access to information has dynamically shifted. Back when I was getting caught cheating on 2nd grade spelling tests, if you had asked where knowledge could be found, the answer would most likely be the library. But where can knowledge be found today? Everywhere. Knowledge is literally at our fingertips and in the air around us.

So how much of this has been reflected in how we treat knowledge and education? Now don’t get me wrong, I am not condoning students who buy papers or text each other test answers. That is ignorance and gets one nowhere. But how much has pedagogy shifted to imparting knowledge within an environment with increased and immediate access to information?

During the Q&A portion of my teaching demonstration for my current position, a particularly wayward student attempted to give me the “doozy” question. He asked me if I was familiar with a certain design program, to which I said I was. Then he asked which key was the hotkey shortcut for a particular function of this program. This sparked a twenty-minute debate between the student and the faculty about the validity of the question. When I was finally able to contribute my own answer I asked him this question, what makes someone a good cook? Are you a bad cook because you can’t produce every food item in existence? Sure you can make a badass scaloppini, but you don’t have a Étouffée recipe memorized, pah!

Does it take having every recipe in existence memorized to be a great cook? Of course not. So why would this be true of software programs or any other field? Sure everyone should learn facts. We must be exposed to ideas and concepts to be aware of their existence. But I believe we should also focus on teaching how to find information rather than belaboring over teaching infinite details. Teaching students how to utilize resources of information will prove much more valuable with the increasing interplay of technology into our everyday lives. There is the old adage, “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” True, I don’t know every software hotkey shortcut. But I do know where to go to find that information. And that is what I focus on in my teaching. Giving students the tools to teach themselves, to find information and to utilize the resources that we are surrounded with everyday. Which reminds me of another quote by Einstein, "I do not teach anyone I only provide the environment in which they can learn."

Think back to how many tests you’ve taken that were just a regurgitation of facts you quickly memorized before the test. How much of that information have you retained? Chances are not most of it. But I bet you can “google” it, can’t you?

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image credit:

Jared Stein, Utah Valley University

http://www.flickr.com/photos/5tein/2348649752/

Are practice and theory mutually exclusive?

I have never really defined myself as either a theoretician or as a practitioner. To me they go hand in hand. We can't make without a concept of why, and we can't determine why without an understanding of how. But recently I've discovered that not everyone feels the same way.

When talking with some colleagues about a potential new hire in their department, there was some division between those who wanted a "practitioner" while others vied for a "theoretician." I was confused by this debate, as someone capable of both abilities would seem to be the best choice and not that rare of a find. Needless to say, I was a bit concerned when asking a candidate for a new media-related position to name some applications they consider "new media," but they were unable to name even one application. Not one. In defense of this stance was the claim, "well they are a theoretician." But I ask, how informed can one's theory be if they are unfamiliar with the elements of which they are making assertions? No one seemed to think it was unusual that someone who was writing theory couldn't actually utilize the field in which they were in which they were decreeing. How informed could this position ever really be?

Another example happened recently. I was speaking with one of the department's art history adjuncts about him making the decision to go back to school for his Ph.D. I told him that I had played around with the idea occasionally of possibility getting a doctorate myself. He got a kind of quizzical expression on his face and then he said "But you're an MFA. You're studio. Why would you ever do that?" Clearly to him, art studio and art theory were two separate fields. Even within my own field there is this concept of theory and practice as separate entities. Theory and practice are treated as mutually exclusive fields.

But is this a successful model? How can either be successful without some involvement of the other? On the one hand I am a studio artist. And yet I am also immersed in theory. I study theories of imagery, symbolism and signs. But I am also specifically interested in a sort of visual sociology. I use my art to explore these very real, social concepts. In this way I am both practitioner and theoretician simultaneously. This balance I try to impart to my students as well. A purely art theory curriculum would leave the gap of skill, while a purely technical curriculum would have students who can make, but have very little to say or think about in their work.

I feel that theory and practice can never successfully be mutually exclusive. Heck even Arthur Danto, the most important living aesthetic theorist in the world, makes woodcuts. There's something about Arthur Danto making his own artwork that validates him even more for me. He not only "talks the talk," he "walks the walk."

The Resurgence of the "Link" Page

Back in the 90's, when many of us were just discovering the potential for the internet, you could often spot a links page on most "personal" websites. Usually these links took you to related people and pages. This of course, was the first leanings towards a hyper environment in which data was analogously connected. But as webpage design evolved, the "links" page was pretty much 86ed on professional webpages by the early 2000s.

So I was a bit surprised when recently perusing the artist websites on Artist A Day to find the return of the "links" page. And now I'm curious what has prompted this return. The original links pages seemed to focus more on sites with similar content, in other words, "here's someone else doing the same thing I'm doing." And the links took you from one static content page to another. But it seems that this second wave speaks more to the interconnectedness of the internet. And that mimics social media in a lot of ways. "Here are people I know." "Here are other people doing interesting, interconnected stuff."

I don't know if I've totally resolved these differences to my personal satisfaction yet, but you will notice that I do indeed have links to other pages on this blog. Some of the people I know and some I don't - but they are all doing something, maybe not the same way I am, but in someway they all embrace the interconnectedness of media and ideas.

Every Artist Needs a Web Presence

When I got married I had a dilemma – how, if at all, should I change my name to reflect my new “status”?  Being as my maiden name was Murphy, I wasn’t too concerned with preserving any cultural legacies or try to keep a family line from disappearing.

I’ve heard tale of a few other Murphys out there.

There was nothing incredibly good or bad about the name Liz Murphy, it’s a pretty straightforward name.  My other option, Thomas, was straightforward as well.  So still no tiebreakers.  I had been warned against the hyphen and I didn’t really like those kinds of names anyway.  So I still needed a tiebreaker.  That’s when I “Googled” my name.

I’m sure many people have done this and depending on how common your name is, most people probably have some doppelgangers out there.  Well it turns out that my doppelganger "Liz Murphy" is also an artist and she makes children’s work.  That’s a problem.  As an artist myself, if someone were searching for me they might mistake doppel-Liz’s work for mine.  So then I tried "Liz Thomas," and guess what?  My other doppel-Liz is a curator of art at UC Berkley!  Another problem.

Having a web presence will only work if it is unique.  If someone didn’t know me but knew I was an artist who also curates, I could be mistaken with either of these ladies.  Which I don’t want, and I’ll assume they don’t want either.  It was at this point that I searched for what became my new name, Liz Murphy Thomas.  When I searched for the name in Google, no one came up.

That is until now.  Now if you search "Liz Murphy Thomas," you’ll get several pages worth of links and all of them are me – no doppelgangers.

Right now I am teaching an advanced capstone course for all graduating art majors and one of the requirements is to create a web portfolio.  In my opinion, all artists need a website because all artists need a web presence.  This isn’t just the domain of graphic designers and new media artists any more.  To communicate in the 21st century, is to be a part of social media.  A web presence is integral to being a part of social media.  Artists have always struggled with representation and distribution, and what cheaper way is there to disseminate your artwork than on the web?   Sites like Artist A Day and MYARTSPACE will even help distribute your work even further.

If you haven’t yet, Google your name.  Are you one of the top hits?  Are you in there at all? Having a web presence will only work if people can find you – so what can you do today to develop your unique web presence?

Taking your own advice

It always amuses me when faculty behave just like the students we complain about.  Chitchatting or texting while in meetings, putting things off until the last minute, and especially staying in a comfort zone.  We've all probably had this student.  The student that is pretty good, but is stuck doing the same thing because they are ultimately scared of failing by trying something new.  But sometimes, faculty are just as guilty of this.

At my institution, I teach an introductory level course on digital media that fills on a regular basis.  I have taught this course every semester and some summers since I began teaching there.   This is a pretty taxing course to teach over and over again - the basics of the Mac OS, photoshop, image resolution,etc - can become somewhat redundant.

So what a lot of faculty do is simply trade out the course and hand it over to someone else, usually an adjunct, for a semester or two.  Besides the fact that this is somewhat impossible with the current budget situation, I also disagree with this in general.  While teaching introductory-level courses isn't "glamourous" or "exciting," it is (pun intended) the foundation of the rest of the student's education.  Too often I hear faculty complain that students in their intermediate and advanced courses are lacking in the basic skills they should have received at the entry level and yet, they themselves can't be bothered to teach these skills.

So believing this, and considering the budget crunch, I had to find a way to break out of the assignment rut in which I found myself.  Being an introductory level course, there were some very specific goals that the class needed to cover:

• Introduction and utilization of the Mac OS environment
  
• Understanding of pixels, resolution and dpi
  
• Basic Adobe Photoshop skills
  
• Combining image and text effectively
  
• Basic web design principles
  
• Basic video editing

Having taught this class many times, I had developed assignments that I felt best fulfilled these requirements.  But I decided to give myself an assignment.  I would push myself to create new assignments that fulfilled the same goals as the old assignments.  I pushed myself out of my comfort zone.   In creating new assignments, I actually discovered two things.  That my new assignments were not only just as good, but in some cases, better.  And that the class was fun and interesting again.  Isn't this the same thing we promise that student who is afraid to try something new?   That trying to push ourselves beyond our imposed boundaries can lead to new ways of thinking and doing things?  I think it is important for faculty to remember to take their own advice sometimes.  We just might be surprised with what we find.

New Media and Sustainability

As of the upcoming fall term I will no longer require textbooks in my studio classes.  I hope to follow suit with my lecture/theory courses soon thereafter.  I will also no longer print syllabi or assignments unless requested.  Instead I will be utilizing Blackboard and electronic resources in all of my courses.

I decided to make these changes for the simple reason that these traditional communication methods were no longer effective.  Sustainability was not even really on my radar originally. Sure I didn't go out of my way to be detrimental, but hey, I'd seen Penn and Teller's Bullshit! episode on recycling, and I thought I knew a lot of it was bunk.   I was simply tired of students not really reading the books, leaving the handouts behind and generally not utilizing these resources that I slaved so long over a hot xerox machine to prepare for them (ok, guilt trip over).

So I started to use new media more and more in my classrooms.  Originally I was only focused on the communication aspect, but as I continued to transition materials, I found that sustainability was a welcome side effect.  Some of my coworkers from the dean's office of another college asked me to help design some materials for their college's transition towards sustainability and that's really what got the ball rolling.  Working with them to get recycled paper in the copy machines (they still haven't!), convincing my department to switch to recycled paper and using 100% post-consumer content archival photo paper in the gallery for editorial cartoonist Ted Rall's work have all shown me that sustainability is achievable and doesn't necessarily mean one has to sacrifice.

And then I realized that utilizing new media, while I had my other motives originally, is another way to promote sustainability.  Sure computers and electronic devices use energy, but saving paper saves energy, fossil fuels and (most importantly to a university) money.  New media is transforming more than just communication, it can also change the way we utilize resources and the way we affect the world around us.  How important is sustainability in your use of new media?  How can you utilize new media today in a way that is both convenient and sustainable?

Ur doin it wrong!

During my undergrad experience I witnessed the most vicious critique I had ever heard.  While I was not the "critiquee," I never forgot the experience or the effect on the remainder of the class.  The class was an advanced photography course and this student had produced several pieces throughout the course that were conceptually strong but not well executed and tedious to experience. The final straw came when she presented a 45 minute, silent, static video piece. The critique quickly turned ugly. Instead of focusing on the work, the comments became personal attacks that ended with her leaving the room in tears. She refused to return to class for the last few remaining weeks of the term.

Since then I have been in many critiques.  Students and faculty have recounted similar horror stories and the resulting battle scars.  I recently had a student express concern over an upcoming group critique because they were worried about receiving harsh feedback.  This led me to examine the critique process, what it should and shouldn't be, and how we can all get the most benefit from the process without resorting to making people run from the room never to return.

So what is the function of an art critique?  Let's start by defining what it is not:

• It is not a chance to show off how wordy you can be.
  
• It is not a chance to rip on someone you don't like.
  
• It should never be an attack on personal qualities.
  
• It should never be mean-spirited.

So what should it be?  In my introductory level course I use the analogy of a friend or relative having toilet paper stuck to their shoe.  You wouldn't let them walk around like that would you?  So you tell them, but not with malice or to embarrass them, but to save them from embarrassment.  This is the approach I try to take and instill in my students.  The long term goal of a critique is to give productive feedback that leads to a better product that communicates with intention. 

• Any critique comment should always be constructive and should have the ultimate goal of improvement of the work.
  
• Someone doesn't have to make work you like, but they should be helped to make the work that they are making better.
  
• Style does not connote quality.
  
• Before speaking ask yourself, "How will this suggestion/comment make the work stronger?"
  
• Have your students pair up and have one take notes on the other's critique.  While you're in the "hot seat" it's hard to remember the good things that are being said.
  

At the end of the day the critique should help each student to become a better artist.  I often tell my students this has nothing to do with me.  You might never see me again.  So who cares if I like your work?  What matters is you.  Who are you?  What do you want your work to say?

I still feel badly about that critique in undergrad.   We were tired and frustrated and we took it out on her.  That was not constructive.  And the real lesson was that we should give someone the critique we would want to receive - toilet paper and all.

The Mythology of Art Education

When I was a little kid I always hated that feeling of not knowing what was going on because I had missed a day of class. Usually I'd have a moment of confusion and would wrack my brain to try to figure out what was being talked about, until I would realize "oh I was absent that day."

Interestingly enough, these feeling didn't go away even after I became a full-fledged "adult." In college and grad school and then into my first few teaching gigs, I would often see other artists and educators getting grants and having impressive shows and I would say to myself, "where did they learn how to do that? Was I absent the day they taught this?"

Now as an educator myself, I have come to realize that the fault lies more with a disconnection between the expectations of education and the way art pedagogy is handled.

So what are the myths of Art education?

1. Art critics will "discover" you and your artwork will become famous
   
2. Getting into art galleries is easy and means that you have "made it"

Sadly, these ideals are quite removed from what students actually experience in their classes, and these concepts of exhibition and exposure remain as abstract concepts rather than experience and practice. Instead, students are left with a success strategy much like that of the Southpark underpants gnomes.

Art education focuses on the process with the promise of future success, but very little, if any instruction focuses on the practice of how to reach success. Art students, like the underpants gnomes, are left without a phase 2.

So what is Phase 2? For me it has been the integration of as much "real life" experience as I can fit into my classes. My department offers a capstone course called Professional Skills which I get to teach this term. This course focuses on our graduating seniors by asking them to develop an artist statement, a cv and put together an exhibition of their work. I have also integrated portfolio development into the course and I am requiring that every student create a website and develop a web presence. Today every artist needs a website, not just digital media designers.  Additionally in another course I teach, Creativity and the Internet (see my post from March 17th), the focus is on examining and participating in the developing "user driven" Internet environment.  While some skill and technique are covered, the focus of the class is on aesthetic development, creative expression and community interaction.

The goal here is twofold. Art educators should focus more on "phase 2" in their classes. But we should also reconsider the original mythology of art education. Part of social media is a restructuring of success. I don't have to get into the Gagosian to be considered a "good" artist. I'll never be "discovered." While art education has to shift, so does our perception of success in the arts.

New Design!

Yes, I'm new to blogging. No, I didn't use the most sophisticated blog publisher. But hey I'm learning. It's just difficult when your learning is visible to the world. But this is my new layout, I think it's a bit less generic, what do you think?

Profit, Art-Making and the Web

A concern that is often raised when discussing art and social media is profit.  "How can you make money if you give things away?"

In February, my gallery exhibited the 3D modeling sculptures of Bathsheba Grossman.  If you haven't heard of her you should really check out her work, it is a most interesting fusion of digital imaging, art, science and mathematics (see, there is a reason art majors should study math!).  I was very taken with her artist statement and the way she handles work production and distribution:

My plan is to make these designs available, rather than restrict the supply.  It's more like publishing than like gallery-based art marketing: we don't feel that a book has lost anything because many people have read it.  In fact it becomes more valuable as it gains wide currency and influence.  With the advent of 3D printing, this is the first moment in art history when sculpture can be, in this sense, published.  I think it's the wave of the future.

I think it is as well.  I've never been an artist for profit.  Of course I want to be successful and appreciated as an artist but profit has never been my main motivation for the creation of artwork.  If I really cared about finances I would have never pursued two art degrees or teaching in the arts.  Believe me, I'm not in it for the money, because the money isn't always there.  If financial consistency was my main goal I should have become a doctor or majored in business or pretty much done anything besides becoming an artist.  I have sold my work, but I don't believe in charging outlandish prices for diamond-encrusted skulls and whatnot.  This mindset is everything that is wrong with art making.  And according to this article, with the economy the way it is, inflated art values might have reached the end of the road.

But what happens to the value of work when there are unlimited amounts or if it is given away for free?  Instinctively, this sounds like a bad idea because it isn't the model of distribution we are used to.  But then again we are dealing with a medium that has not existed and new models of marketing are necessary.  Recently there has been a lot of talk about the comedy group Monty Python's page on YouTube.  Their site states:

No more of those crap quality videos you've been posting. We're giving you the real thing - HQ videos delivered straight from our vault.
What's more, we're taking our most viewed clips and uploading brand new HQ versions. And what's even more, we're letting you see absolutely everything for free. So there!

Crazy?  Many people thought so.  If you give content away for free, then who will pay for it?  But that's just what has happened.  Shortly thereafter, YouTube reported that Monty Python's DVD sales increased 23,000 percent on Amazon.  And Trent Reznor (of Nine Inch Nails) has employed a similar method of offering some material free and charging for higher quality and "collectible" versions on their website.  These are a few of the more popular examples floating around, but there are countless more artists out there finding new ways to distribute their work and get recognition.

Artists now have more freedom to reach a wider range of audience.  We should not fear the web as a place where others will "steal" away our work without paying.  But we should approach the web as a place to share, to sample and to reach more of an audience than ever before.  Exposure is a currency in itself.

Social Media in the Classroom

Being as this week is spring break, I've been tempted not to write, but then I saw this great list by Chris Brogan on 100 topics to blog about. I got to item #12 before I was inspired; (maybe someday I'll read the other 88 topics).

The topic that stood out was How Schools Could Use Social Media. 

I mentioned earlier that I've been included in interviewing candidates for a New-Media Journalism position. While giving one of the candidates a tour of my classroom - which is a computer lab - the candidate lamented at the layout of the room. "Oh, you have the teacher station in the front, don't you hate that? You can't make sure they aren't goofing around." I told them it didn't really bother me anymore if my students were using facebook in class. I also said if I can't beat them, I might as well join them. Using facebook has allowed me to connect with my students more as individuals and it has even allowed me to "catch" students skipping class by monitoring their status. (I should mention here that I do not seek out students on facebook. If students find me and wish to add me, I accept, but I don't initiate).

Yesterday I read this article in the Chronicle, Students Stop Surfing After Being Shown How In-Class Laptop Use Lowers Test Scores. While the argument is inherently flawed due to an extremely small sample group (oh yes, I took statistics in college) I also have to disagree with the concept in general.

By the very nature of the subject I teach, computers are an integral part of the classroom experience. I'll often find myself encouraging students to use the internet in class. They will tell me they don't know something or they can't find something and I'll teasingly say "If only there were some sort of electronic device available that allowed us to instantly access all the information in the world." In other words, I feel the internet can be an enhancement to the classroom experience. Very often in a lecture or discussion my students and I will utilize the internet to find additional information or solve a technical issue.

But social media in the classroom, I argue, can be just as useful. Last summer I developed a course called Creativity and the Internet. The focus of the course was using social media sites as a launching pad for creative ideas and exploration as well as developing professional and like-minded contacts. Using sites like flickr, youtube, vimeo and now facebook and twitter, young artists can start to make connections, be inspired and possibly even sell their art. In another new course that I developed this term, The Digital Image in Art, my students have been asked to set up a flickr page for their work. In this way critiques become more than a one-way conversation between the student and myself. The dialog is opened up, students and even people outside the class can comment on anyone's work. This changes the course considerably, it is no longer insular, no longer disconnected from the world.

To use social media in the classroom is to allow the world to enter into your class. Too often college classes operate as a "practice round" but the transition step from practice to implementation is often absent or briefly thrown in at the end. Utilizing social media opens our classes to practical experience at every step of the way. There is a decentralization of authority and an increase in connections, critiques and points of view. While this could be seen as scary or the loss of "control" over a class, I see it as a far more practical, realistic view of the world and pedagogy in the 21st century.