• The Technoetic Arts BA

    Course Description

    The Technoetic Arts degree programme is an advanced art course based on a research-creation paradigm, involving the student in both theoretical and practical work, through the convergent field of art , technology and consciousness studies. Over the four years of the course, students are immersed in a dynamic framework of understanding, knowing, creating and exposing that evolves and manifests through all aspects of artistic expression, and applications of science and technology.

    Mission

    The BA Technoetic Arts programme is designed to prepare students for a career in the field of new media arts and to contribute to the parameters of social and cultural life. It aims to enable students to develop a predictive intelligence to tools and software, making technoetic art practice anticipatory, whilst grounded in the contemporary moment. Students choose to apply for this programme, and find the support of family and friends for their choice, once they become aware of the scope of possibilities - financial, professional, and artistic - that this degree program can enable its graduates to achieve. This is a relatively new development in China, which will increasingly have important results in the art and design professions, in curating and the direction of public museums and commercial galleries, in university teaching and research, and in the cultural marketplace. It will be to the great advantage of students to be in this field as it emerges into the future; it offers an opportunity to make a unique contribution to modern China, and to its rich heritage. The motto of the Studio is The Future is Now!

     

    With good publicity, frequent exhibitions, and ubiquitous online presence, the Ascott Technoetic Arts initiative successfully competes for world attention with programs throughout China, and in Korea, Japan, and the West. The programme expects to continue to enjoy consistently good enrolments.

    Definition

    'Technoetics is a convergent field of practice that seeks to explore consciousness and connectivity through digital, telematic, chemical and spiritual means, embracing both interactive and psychoactive technologies, and the creative use of moistmedia.' (Roy Ascott 2008)

    Ref: www.intellectbooks.co.uk/journals/view-journal,id=142/

     

    As we move into the future, Technoetic Artsstudents face the challenge of creating a syncretic art that explores telematics (planetary connectivity), nanotechnology (bottom up construction), quantum computing (augmented cyberception), cognitive science and pharmacology (field consciousness), and esoterica (psychic instrumentality).

     

    Students may work in a wide range of artistic practices, including digital telecommunications, Internet connectivity, screen-based hypermedia, digital film, multi-media installations, intelligent architecture, smart products, robotics, telepresence systems, computer modelling of behaviour, remote sensing devices, cyberspace and virtual reality, artificial life, popular culture, contemporary music, sonic art, video art and performance.

    Aims & Objectives

    To develop, at the highest international level, the field of technoetic art practice in China, through progressive teaching, learning and research, that will fully explore and exploit cybernetic, telematic, technoetic, and syncretic methodologies, actions, and outputs.

    Curriculum Structure

    In aiming to enable individual creative development in relation to art, technology and consciousness research, the curriculum it is built on the generative principle of the lattice, an open network, consisting of:

     

    Poles

    • Information (knowing)

    • Structure (building)

    • Concept (thinking)

     

    Orientations

    • Analysis (materials, software, tools, systems)

    • Theory (historical and emergent)

    • Social application (real world problems)

    • Speculation (anticipatory, propositional, expressive)

    • Interaction (transformative instrumental)

     

    Threads

    • Telematic Narrative (time-based, interactive)

    • Moistmedia (bio, neuro, nano )

    • Syncretic environment (variable reality, modeling, prototyping, Internet of Things)

    • Behavioural studies (performance, identity, collaboration)

    • Communications (language, semiotic systems, cyberception)

     

    Skills

    Skills are taught and acquired incrementally, at the point of need in the development of the student’s work. The process is assisted by scheduled access to the skill station.

     

    Course Modules

    The identification of specific course subjects is accomplished by a collaborative process employing the lattice model of poles, orientations, and threads. Based on these principles, the curriculum must be seen as emergent but stable, subject to collaborative development involving faculty, administrative, and student representation.

     

    • Cultivation of Ethical Thinking

    • Physical Education

    • Communication (Chinese | English)

    • Paradigms of Art

    • Comparative Culture

    • Tools, Software and Systems

    • Cybernetics

    • Moistmedia

    • Narrative

    • Cyberception

    • Behaviour-Identity-Environment

    • Personal Development

    • Critical Integration/Methodology

    Career Opportunities

    Students may work in a wide range of artistic practices, including digital telecommunications, Internet connectivity, screen-based hypermedia, digital film, multi-media installations, intelligent architecture, smart products, robotics, telepresence systems, computer modeling of behavior, remote sensing devices, cyberspace and virtual reality, artificial life, popular culture, contemporary music, sonic art, video art and performance, new media, mixed techniques events (Galleries, Exhibitions, Residencies, etc.)

    New media management activities (Planning, Organization, Curation, Communication)

    Art Direction: Traditional Applied (online, games, film) or below the line media driven events (new media-oriented communications etc.)

    Further Education and Research (2nd Degree, MFA, PhD)

    Innovation, Business applications in all new media creative domains.

    Admissions

    Those interested in the program, should email (in English) royascottstudio@detaoma.com, giving full contact details, to receive comprehensive application details.

    Duration of the Technoeic Arts Advanced Degree Programme

    4 Years: 2 Semesters per Year, September to January and February-June

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    The DeTao Master of Technoetic Arts

    Roy Ascott, recipient of the first Ars Electronica Golden Nica award for Visionary Pioneers of Media Art, focuses on the impact of digital and telecommunications networks on consciousness. His work has been shown at the Shanghai Biennale, Venice Biennale, Milan Triennale, Biennale do Mercosul Brazil, European Media Festival, INDAF 2010 Korea, and the Musée d'Art Moderne, Paris. His work is in the permanent collection of the Tate Gallery, London and other notable collections. He has advised universities, arts councils, media centers, and festivals in Europe, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, Japan, Korea, USA and UNESCO. He is the founding President of the Planetary Collegium, an international network for doctoral research. In 2012, Roy Ascott became DeTao Master of Technoetic Arts at the DeTao Masters Academy, to promote the development of teaching and research in art, science, technology and consciousness in China. Since 2017, he has also been the Chief Specialist of the Visual Art Innovation Institute at the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing.

     

    More about Roy Ascott's artworks

    A Tribute to the Messenger Shaman: Roy Ascott. Journal of Cybernetics and Human Knowing,issue 2-3 2018. https://www.chkjournal.com/sites/default/files/_13_ap11_149-163.pdf

  • Faculty Members

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    Clarissa Ribeiro Ph.D

    Course Coordinator/ Pete Townshend Senior Lecturer in Performative Cybernetics

    Architect, media artist and researcher, Ph.D. (Doctor in Fine Arts, University of Sao Paulo and CAiiA hub of The Planetary Collegium), Fulbright Postdoctoral Scholarship awardee (UCLA, Art|Sci Center/James Gimzewski Lab), M.Arch. (Master of Architecture Theory and History, University of Sao Paulo), member of the UCLA Art|Sci Collective, she is the chair of the first Leonardo/ISAST LASER talks to be hosted in Brazil/Latin America (2017-present). She was part of the founding team of the Roy Ascott Studio in Shanghai and has been serving as a reviewer for the Leonardo Abstracts Service (Leonardo LABS), the Leonardo Journal and the Intellect Books’ Technoetic Arts Journal. Having performative technoetics and digital humanities as compass, she is interested in cross-scale information and communication dynamics that impacts human-nonhuman behavior and other macro-scale emergent phenomena. Exploring in her more recent projects the metaphysics of information-visualization in subversive morphogenetic strategies, she welcomes the animistic to navigate ecologies-as-cosmologies. Clarissa has exhibited and presented her work internationally in collective exhibitions and solo shows, artist talks, paper and panel sessions, and workshops in several edition of FILE Sao Paulo, ISEA, Ars Electronica, SIGGRAPH, SIGGRAPH Asia, China VIS, POM, Consciousness Reframed, CAA, IEEE VIS ART program. She is a Professor at the University of Fortaleza where she directs the LIP – Lab for Innovation and Prototyping.

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    Chen Yufei Ph.D

    Senior Lectuer

    Chen Yufei is a sound artist and engaged in the research of analytical philosophy for many years.During his master's degree, his main research focuses on skepticism and strategies. During his doctor's degree, he mainly studies free will ( determinism, randomness over uncertainty, and discussion on the relationship between order, logic and freedom). Chen Yufei has been engaged in live music performance and sound creation for many years, and has rich experience in cooperation with different artists and studios, such as low-tech laboratory, UFO studio, SLATE Contemporary Dance Troupe, etc.

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    Huang Wei

    Lecturer

    Huang Wei is an artist based in Shanghai. His research focuses on equipment feeding, data reproduction, media breeding, information hybridization and audio-visual elements generated from shooting, sampling, misappropriation, field recording, photogrammetry, CG production and parameterization. he has a deep and broad knowledge of the theoretical aesthetic, narrative and technical elements of artistic research. His works mainly reflect on the chaotic situation of information overload, landscape worship, consumerism, algorithm management and intelligent hegemony,etc.

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    Michelle Lewis King Ph.D

    Senior Lecturer

    Drawing on her experiences as a media artist, Chinese medicine physician and medical humanities scholar, Michelle Lewis-King’s work explores the inter-relationships between embodiment, the performance of medicine and cross-cultural approaches to science and technology. During her performances, Michelle repurposes premodern technologies and methods within the Chinese medicine encounter into contemporary tools that investigate humanist questions.

    Michelle has performed at Ars Electronica, TodaysArt NL, and ISEA festivals and at the Victoria & Albert Museum, the Anatomy Museum London, MAAT Lisbon, and Ex Teresa Art Actual Museum Mexico. Her research is published in the Journal of Sonic Studies, The Acupuncturist, Digital Creativity, Red Bull Music Academy Daily, Technoetic Arts, and ELSE Journal of Artistic Research.

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    Mujin

    Senior Lecturer

    Film Director / Media Artist, lives and works in Shanghai. Department Head of Digital Media Art Major in Shanghai Institute of Visual Arts. She was nominated for the "Porsche Biennial Artist" at the ART021 Shanghai Contemporary Art Fair (2019) and her work was selected for UNESCO's Art and Society Project (2020). Her research interests are focused on the navigation space in digital media, considering analyzing the multiplicity of image paradigms from a narrative perspective. Her work have been selected into the art project “FILTER THE PUBLIC" for the fifth anniversary at the Shanghai World Financial Center and Photo Arts Fair Shanghai (2015) and in several international film festivals, including Festival de Cannes 2010 (SFC), shortlisted by Air France Jeunes Talent Prize (2010), and also nominated as Best Director Award in 2012 Madrid International Film Festival. Mujin was also the winner of Grand Prize of the Jury in Festival d’art vidéo et de cultures numériques-videoformes (2012), France.

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    Zhang Hong

    Senior Lecturer

    Media Artist based in Shanghai, Graduated from the New Media Art program at the China Academy of Art and obtained a master's degree in Digital Art Design from the Shanghai Theatre Academy. She has rich experience in New Media Exhibition Design, where she excels in blending art, technology, and interactive experiences to create immersive and innovative exhibitions. In 2011, Zhang Hong was awarded the Lin Fengmian Silver Award. In 2012, she exhibited in the Shanghai Interactive Ink Painting Exhibition and her artwork was featured in the "Image" exhibition at the Himalayas Art Museum's opening. In 2014, Zhang Hong received the Best Innovation Award at the Shanghai International Science and Art Exhibition and the Scientific Progress Award from the Shanghai Municipal Administration of Culture, Radio, Film, and Television. In 2018, Zhang Hong was honored as an " Emerging Artist" at the 19th China International Silk Expo. In 2019, Zhang Hong was awarded the " Pioneer Artist" at the 2019 Tencent New Chic Awards. In 2020, she received the Outstanding Award at the Li Zhengdao Science and Art Exhibition.

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    John Bardakos

    Senior Lecturer

    John (Ioannis) Bardakos is an artist, academic, and researcher who oscillates between Athens, Paris, and Shanghai, acting as a hunter-gatherer of forms and non-localities. His academic journey spans the fields of Mathematics, Digital and Traditional Media with a keen focus on Applied and Fine Arts. This led him further into a PhD in the Philosophy of Technology, Aesthetics, and Art. Bardakos' artistic mastery extends beyond the practical. He possesses an in-depth and extensive knowledge of theoretical aesthetics, narrative, and the technical elements of artistic research. His work represents a profound understanding and innovative experimentation with cybernetics, where he seamlessly merges theory and practice. He employs a variety of methodologies, including Traditional, Analog, Digital, Generative, Virtual, and Interactive approaches. As an experienced educator, Bardakos has collaborated with both traditional academic structures and experimental ex-institutional environments within the realms of art, technology, and philosophy.

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    Eleanor | Zhang Tingting

    Personal Assistant to DeTao Master Roy Ascott, and Technoetic Arts Studio Assistant

    Eleanor graduated from Zhejiang University of Finance and Economics. Since 2016, she is responsible for assisting all programmes, events and activities in the Studio, including teaching, exhibitions, workshops, fieldtrips, and publications.

  • Environment

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    The Roy Ascott Technoetic Arts Studio


    The main studio of Roy Ascott is located in the DeTao building at SIVA, Songjiang, Shanghai. Here, lecturers and administrative personnel offices are also located, including the office of the Planetary Collegium in China. A conference room in this main studio complex provides for seminars and presentations by visiting artists and researchers, and from other Masters of the DeTao Masters Academy.

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    Computer Lab (Virtual Studio)


    The Computer Lab (Virtual Studio) is the main space for experimentation and exposure in virtual/digital applications, creative coding, Interactivity, projection mapping techniques, and the broader spectrum of digital tools, methodologies, and techniques. Using Apple, Windows, Raspberry Pi, Arduino, HTC Vive, and 3D Printing hardware, students are able to explore the digital realm. In terms of software a wide variety of tools are available, from 2d (Adobe suite, Open Source 2d motion/image editing), 3d (Rhinoceros, Blender, Maya, Houdini), coding (HTML, Java, Processing, Python (Raspberry Pi), Max MSP, TouchDesigner, Ableton) and more.

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    Physical Computing- Physical Construction Lab (Physical Studio)


    In the Physical Computing/Construction Studio, students learn how to deal with sensors, micro controllers, electronics, building, laser cutting, assembly and installation.

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    Bio - art Lab (Moistmedia Studio)


    The Bio -art Lab allows experimentation with biological organisms, fungi, plants, bacteria, microscopes, and everything related to the broad moist-media spectrum.

  • Shanghai Institution of Visual Art

  • Technoetic Arts Studio at Detao Masters Academy in SIVA

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