Thursday/ 4:00-7:00pm/ Room 117 Communications

Professor: Irene Gustafson
[831] 459 1498 / Comm 125
click here to email
Office Hours: Thursday 3pm-4pm and by appointment

In this graduate critical studies/production course, the third in a series of courses offered over consecutive quarters, students will investigate various methods for producing arguments in both written and visual/aural texts. The foundational skills that the entire sequence – 200A/B/C --- seeks to build are: to devise forms for critical and creative research and production, to engender interchange between approaches and modes, and to set standards for critical and creative engagement and production. The particular emphasis of this course will be on 1) the interwoven identities and practices of the artist, researcher, and teacher, 2) the formal and expressive possibilities made exclusively available to “hybridized” research, and 3) the larger cultural and political issues raised by interdisciplinarity and the merging of institutionally separated methods of inquiry.

For the first half of the quarter, students will examine the various institutional contexts for “knowledge production” within the arts. During the second half of the quarter, students will produce original research based on their individual research interests. Students will generate methodological questions -- which will form the basis of their projects-- that pertain to the particularities of producing scholarship across “theory and praxis,” and across word and image. The Film and Digital Media Department has defined its PhD program as existing at the intersection of “theory” and “praxis.” This class presumes that the perceived distinctions between these modes has been, for the most party, institutionally produced and maintained. If this course does not presume an ontological or philosophical distinction between theory and practice, it does acknowledge a gap, a significant difference, between the processes and products of writing and image/sound production.

Students will participate in technical workshops on production and post-production techniques. As our class time together is limited to one weekly 3-hour meeting, students may be expected to participate in these workshops outside of our regularly scheduled class. Additionally, students are expected to participate in outside screenings--- either as a group or individually. All titles will be available on-line or through the McHenry Film/Music Center.

Students are responsible for providing your own external hard drives, CD or DVD media, or film stock.

There are 2 books required for this class (available at the Baytree Bookstore):
• Artists with PhDs: On the New Doctoral Degree in Studio Art, Ed. James Elkins (Washington, DC: New Academia Publishing, 2009)
• The Signature of All Things, On Method, Giorgio Agamben (New York: Zone Books, 2009)

You will also be accessing texts on line:
Vectors--- http://www.vectorsjournal.org/
Cabinet--- http://cabinetmagazine.org/issues/soldout/cover.php

The equipment checkout facility is located in the Communications Building, Room 137
Check In: Monday/ Thursday 9:00am-12:00pm
Check Out: Tuesday/ Friday 12:30pm - 4:00pm
fdmcheckout@ucsc.edu 459-4062

LINDA GARFIELD, operations manager: lindag@ucsc.edu 459 2348
NICK DULIN, equipment checkout specialist: ndulin@ucsc.edu 459 4062
ANGIE ROSSI-STEELE, lead digital media specialist: arossi@ucsc.edu 459 4242
TRISTAN CARKEET, digital media specialist: carkeet@ucsc.edu 459 3512

SLUGFILM [checkout, reservation, facilities]: http://slugfilm.ucsc.edu/

PDF copies of equipment manuals are available via the slugfilm website> production support> links and resources> hardware manuals
Sony PMW-EX1
Canon Powershot G2
Marantz PMD660 Field Recorder
Flip Video Cameras
Canon 5D Mark Camera (forthcoming)
Assorted microphones, tripods, lights

1.

INTRODUCTION
THURSDAY March 31st

Introduction to the course, introduction to production facilities

Viewing: Strike Anywhere (Benj Gerdes and Jennifer Hayashida, 2009, 32 min.)
http://www.clnswp.org/2009/05/strike-anywhere/

2.

PERSPECTIVES
THURSDAY April 7

Reading: from Artists with PhDs: On the New Doctoral Degree in Studio Art
Jones, “Research Degrees in Art and Design”
Slager, “Art and Method”
Wilson, “Four Theses Attempting to Revise the Terms of the Debate”
Burgin, “Thoughts on Research Degrees on Visual Arts Departments”
Wilson, “The Studio Art Doctorate in America”
Van Gekder and Baetens, “The Future of the Doctorate in the Arts”
Elkins, “On Beyond Research and New Knowledge”

3.

TEST BALLON #1 due: Translation

THURSDAY April 14
Viewing and critique: student projects

4.

TEST BALLON #2 due: Permutation

THURSDAY April 21
Viewing and critique: student projects

5.

3-4pm: 16mm shoot in studio B

Arri-S manual (pdf)

TEST BALLON #3 due: Dialogue

THURSDAY April 28
Viewing and critique: student projects

6.

3-4pm: Canon 5D Mark shoot

Canon 5D Mark II manual (pdf)

TEST BALLON #4 due: Cumulation

THURSDAY May 5
Viewing and critique: student projects

Project Proposal Due (prompt available as pdf here)

7.

THURSDAY May 12

3-4pm: Sony PMW-F3K Super 35mm XDCAM EX camera with PL Mount Lens Kit shoot

Sony PMW-F3K Super 35mm XDCAM EX manual (pdf)

TEST BALLON REPORT due: a 3-page rumination on the process of working within one of the “test” constraints. Report should include—“Goal, Result, Evaluation”

Reading: Giorgio Agamben, from The Signature of All Things, On Method
“What is a Paradigm?”

8.

THURSDAY May 19

Reading: Giorgio Agamben, from The Signature of All Things, On Method
“Theory of Signatures” and “Philosophical Archaeology”

9.

THURSDAY May 26

Reading: Cabinet (back issue, vol # to be determined)

http://cabinetmagazine.org/issues/soldout/cover.php

http://www.cabinetmagazine.org/events/art_education.php

10.

THURSDAY June 2

Reading: Vectors: Difference Vol. 3, Issue 1

http://www.vectorsjournal.org/

Producing an Editorial Statement

TUESDAY June 7th 12-3:00pm INDIVIDUAL PROJECTS DUE/ Editorial Statement Due
viewing/critique

• Test Balloon #1/ Translation 10% [due Thursday April 14th]
Translate a written text in to a visual one. Emphasis is upon the process or result of changing from one appearance, state, or phase to another. As with any translation, issues of fidelity are important. Be mindful about what you must change and what stays the same

•Test Balloon #2/ Permutation 10% [due Thursday April 21st]
This is a “found footage” exercise. You will be permuting some visual text to produce a new one.

• Test Balloon #3/ Dialogue 10% [due Thursday April 28th]
A project based on a dialogue between two class members. Dialogue topic TBD. How do you represent/enact the dialogue through text and image?

• Test Balloon #4/ Cumulation 10% [due Thursday May 5th]
Additive, text + image

• Test Balloon Report 5% [due Thursday May 19th]
a 3-page rumination on the process of working within one of the “test” constraints. Should include—“Goal, Result, Evaluation”

• Test Balloon #5/ Individual Project 40% [due Thursday June 7th]

• Test Balloon #6/ Collaborative Editorial Statement 5% [due Thursday June 7th]
A collaboratively produced editorial statement that introduces and contextualizes the works which constitute our final project viewing.