One of the three things I spent time on while on research leave earlier this year was exploring intersections between Internet art and Internet research - including through being able to have more regular studio time. So I’m looking forward to continuing to explore this area through co-teaching a much-refreshed module on Internet poetics this coming autumn. 🍂🍵🌌🌕

Alternating between small screen walks and studio sessions, we will explore how features of the internet can be artistically reworked for critical inquiry into digital culture. We’ll also be drawing inspiration from repertoires of the vernacular web, handmade web, poetic web and associated tendencies - to explore how artistic approaches might support collective inquiry, experimentation and imagination around other ways of being online together.

The outline of the module is copied below. It is co-taught with Liliana Bounegru. One of the first things we’ll be doing with students is reviewing projects which artistically rework features of the internet for inquiry into digital culture. If you can think of interesting or under-appreciated examples, we’d love to hear from you. We’re particularly interested in hearing about projects outside Europe and North America. If you’re also teaching in this area, or would otherwise be interested in chatting about what we’re doing - feel free to get in touch. 🦔

Internet poetics - critical and creative inquiry with data, digital infrastructures and the web

module description

How can the web, online platforms and data be leveraged for critical and creative inquiry? How might digital societies and cultures be organised with different kinds of dynamics and logics?

With the rise of “big tech” platforms and services, there has been a resurgence of interest in what is called the “poetic internet” - experimental, alternative and playful ways of knowing, relating and being together online.

This module surveys how artists, designers, technologists, community groups, journalists and researchers explore the capacities of the web as a cultural, social and political medium. We will review how Internet artists from Olia Lialina to Chia Amisola work with web browsers as devices for artistic exploration, as well as how groups like the School for Poetic Computation, Permacomputing Club and HTML Energy encourage inventive computational artefacts. We will learn about feminist, decolonial, queer, speculative and other approaches to working with data, the web and digital infrastructures.

Through a series of hands-on learning sessions we will learn how to critically and creatively repurpose hyperlinks, hashtags, databases, algorithms, archives, bots, scrapers, search results, images, videos and online devices to interrogate and intervene in digital culture and society. Those taking this module will have opportunities to develop creative works and reflective essays at the intersections of critical data studies and critical data practices, Internet research and Internet art.

module aims

This module aims to introduce students to critical and creative engagements with data, digital infrastructures and the web as a cultural, social, and political medium. It explores how the affordances of internet technologies and platforms can be repurposed for collective inquiry, reflection, and experimentation.

Through the study of Internet art, alternative computing practices, and research-led creative projects, the module supports students to interrogate dominant models of digital culture shaped by commercial platforms and to imagine other ways of knowing, relating, and organising online.

The module aims to:

• Develop students’ capacities to critically analyse internet-based artworks and research projects in relation to their technical, cultural, social, economic and political contexts.
• Equip students to experiment with data, digital infrastructures and the web as a medium for inquiry, using creative and research-oriented digital methods, tools, scripts and approaches.
• Support students in designing and producing digital artefacts that critically and creatively engage with networked data, online cultures, infrastructures, and practices.
• Encourage reflective and ethical approaches to working with online data, platforms, and communities.
• Foster interdisciplinary thinking across art, design, media studies, digital humanities, data studies, science and technology studies and associated fields of research and critical practice.

learning outcomes

• Critically analyse, evaluate and situate Internet art and research projects - demonstrating an understanding of the techniques, materials, methods and conceptual approaches they use for engaging with data, code and digital infrastructures.
• Critically engage with debates and developments surrounding the “poetic” internet, including alternative, critical, and community-led approaches to data, computing and digital culture.
• Design and develop digital artefacts that critically and creatively engage with the online data, the web, platforms, and/or digital infrastructures as devices for social and cultural inquiry.
• Work with arts- and research-based digital methods to repurpose databases, hyperlinks, algorithms, scraping, search results, videos, images and other digital devices to investigate digital culture and society.
• Cultivate critical reflection and care in creative and research practices - including with respect to intentions, decisions, limitations, and potential consequences of their work.