Orthographies: New Kinds of Drawings and New Kinds of Things (Fall 2017)

Instructor

Lucy Siyao Liu

Schedule

MW 9:30-12:30

Location

e15-207

How many ways can you draw a circle? Or a field of grass? Or a cloud? Or a barbell?

In this course, we will be looking at, talking about, and making, all kinds of drawings. It is an in-depth exploration of drawing practices in dialogue with alternative forms of representation, such as writing, reading, coding, sculpting, mapping, and digital imaging. This course considers drawing as process, as performance, as incursion, and as cultural technique. Sections of the course will be dedicated to the intersection of drawing practice with poetry, anthropology, scientific experimentation, design, and computational tools. Drawings prompt inquiry into key themes in contemporary artistic practice, such as classification, mimicry, seriality, augmentation through machine-assisted techniques and negotiations between analog and digital.

Weekly lectures, guest presentations and discussions shape individual project trajectories. Course materials are distributed on a collaborative research platform. Students contribute to this experimental working archive by curating a body of research to complement individual drawing projects. The goal is to situate drawing research within a broader landscape of cultural production and to address parallel concerns in other disciplines. Prior experience with drawing and/or programming recommended, but not required. Additional work required of students taking the graduate version.

Image: Milan Grygar, 1969 performing Tactile Drawing #4