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- Title of Abstract:
The Postdisciplinary Digital Practitioner (Ref #227)
- Date:
- 27-10-2006 13:42:19
- Status:
-
Unsuccessful
- Rating:
- 4
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Details:
- New Voices Conference Abstract
Authors: Julian Malins, Jon Pengelly, John Marshall
Title: The Postdisciplinary Digital Practitioner
Abstract
Practitioners are exploring the use of computer-mediated technologies in order to create new work that both express evolving production syntax and a commitment to innovation at the conceptual design phase. This is a result of the increasing democratisation and proliferation of computer-based design and fabrication technologies. A growing number of practitioners are able and willing to engage with computer-mediated design and manufacturing technologies. Contemporary makers require advanced making skills including knowledge of form, volume, colour, and various tangible and intangible qualities, which are normally acquired through a close affinity with materials drawing on direct hands-on experience. There is a need, the authors suggest, to develop a clearer pedagogic understanding and model for this transitional process [virtual to physical] involving both pragmatic and aesthetic sensibilities, whilst also clearly engaging emotions, memory and imagination. These abilities point towards a digital craft language that draws on new topological forms and production processes which extend the traditional haptic and tactile relationships of the designed craft object into broader material cultural domains.
There is a tension, however, in educational terms between acquiring haptic skills associated with making whilst gaining the necessary digital competencies to be able to integrate these new technologies into the practice of making. Overcoming this apparent tension requires the integration of traditional making skills with digital skills, so that the next generation of makers will be capable of transcending conventional subject disciplines and modes of practice. Research being undertaken at Gray?s School of Art has been exploring the concept of transdisciplinary modes of practice. Newly commissioned work exhibited in ?Perimeters, Boundaries and Borders? exhibition (Lancaster, October 2006) has provided key examples of this trend (http://www.fastuk.org.uk/pbb.htm). This paper draws on examples from this exhibition and the accompanying symposium to explore these arguments. The paper discusses the implications of this work for both models of education and sustainable practice for future practitioners.
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