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Teaching as Art

Teachers
Taeyoon Choi, Ashley Jane Lewis
Date
June 19, 2020 to August 22, 2020 (10 classes)
Time
5pm to 7pm ET or 10am to 12pm ET
Location
Online (Zoom)
Cost
$1200 Scholarships available learn more...
Deadline
Applications closed on June 18, 2020

Apply Now

Description

Teaching as Art is for artists and technologists who want to teach. The class is also for teachers who want to advance their art and pedagogy. A good teacher is a great student themself. They transform their curiosity into knowledge and share their learning processes with others. One can learn to become a better teacher by staying fearless about ‘not knowing’ something, embracing radically open ideas and connecting various expertise and knowledge. Teaching can be a form of artistic and creative practice in collaboration with a diverse community. Teachers can invent new forms of learning spaces, new kinds of collaboration and new senses of community. Teachers and students can collaborate on art projects that connect social justice with creative practice. Teaching, learning and unlearning can be a way to make sense of the unsettling world, to build a web of care and accountability and create a micro-institutions for larger, social change. In this class, students will learn about applying creative processes to teaching. Students will read about the history of artists in and out of academic institutions, Black Mountain College, Socially Engaged Art, as well as more recent experiments in Alternative Education. This class was offered at Interactive Telecommunications in New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts in 2017 and 2018 as well as the EYEO Festival in 2017. The class builds upon previous work by SFPC teachers, such as Learning to Learn class by Amit Pitaru and Learning to Teach, Teaching to Learn conference organized by Tega Brain and Taeyoon Choi in partnership with the Processing Foundation. Students of the previous classes went on to become teaching artists in institutions such as MoMA, the New Museum and the Whitney Museum of American Art, professors in various universities, and organizers of Afrotectopia, Computer Mouse Conference and more.

Course of Study

  • Week 1: Learning. Introduction of the course and the instructor’s practice and Teaching philosophy. Questions about Learning.
  • Week 2: Curriculum. What is a curriculum? Artists as educators, performance artwork as curriculum, Joseph Beuys & Fluxus, Judy Chicago & Feminism, Allan Kapprow & Happening.
  • Week 3: Syllabus. What is a syllabus? Create a syllabus from the perspective of a teacher (or a schoolmaster). Your partner will give feedback from the perspective of a student in the school. and vice versa.
  • Week 4: Pedagogy. Lecture about pedagogy, the craft of teaching. Traditional pedagogy and critical pedagogy, alternative education. Special focus on Lygia Clark.
  • Week 5: Inclusive Learning. Lecture on marginalization and inclusion in learning spaces. Midterm proposal workshop and Interdependence activity. Discussion on the reading on Socially Engaged Art.
  • Week 6: Mid-term presentation. Students will present their learning map and plan for the final project
  • Week 7: Unlearning. Lecture on critical pedagogy. How to combine theory and practice in art and teaching, through unlearning and plasticity, appropriation and representation. Comparative reading of Judith Butler and Martha Nussbaum.
  • Week 8: Platforms. Lecture on Accessible and inclusive learning spaces, Makerspaces, community spaces, libraries. Special focus on disability and access for Deaf, blind and wheelchair users.
  • Week 9: Museum as a school. Reading and discussion of Open field at Walker Museum, MoMA’s adult education, Shaun Leonardo’s project at the Guggenheim museum, Art + Technology Lab at LACMA, Machine Project, Triple Canopy and more.
  • Week 10: Final presentation. Students will present their syllabus and workshop samples. The final presentation will be open to the public via Zoom. Guest critics will participate for feedback session.

Expectations

Participants will be expected to…

  • Participate in critical discussions about the topics
  • Offer constructive feedback for each other
  • Share teaching material

Is this class for me?

Q: What type of students are you looking for?

A: This class is intended for aspiring teachers and teachers with many years of experience.

Q: Am I too old or too young to participate?

A: No, we welcome anyone above 18 years old. At SFPC, we had students who were fresh out of highschool and students who were tenured professors participating during their sabbatical. We aim to be a horizontal learning space.

Q: Will I learn to code?

A: Not in the class. You will learn about the history of art and technology, the theory of computation in relation to teaching, and educational organizations. If you want to learn to code, please check out other classes offered at SFPC such as Creative Coding Bootcamp and Digital Love Languages on our Participate page.

Q: Will I get a certificate of completion?

A: We won’t be able to give you a teaching certificate. However, we can offer a letter of completion which you can send to your employer or future client.

Meet the Teachers

teacher

Taeyoon Choi

Taeyoon Choi is an artist, educator, and organizer. He is a co-founder of the School for Poetic Computation, an artist-run institution with the motto of “More Poetry, Less Demo!” Taeyoon seeks a sense of gentleness, intellectual kinship, magnanimity, justice and solidarity in his work and collaboration. He has presented installations, performances and workshops at Eyebeam Art and Technology Center, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, New Museum, M+ Museum, Istanbul Design Biennale, Seoul Mediacity Biennale and Venice Biennale for Architecture. He contributed to alternative education such as the Public School New York, Occupy University and Triple Canopy Publication Intensive. He organized Learning to Teach conference with Tega Brain, in partnership with the Processing Foundation. In 2019, Taeyoon worked with Mimi Onuoha to start the New York Tech Zine Fair, with support from Ritu Ghiya and Neta Bomani. He also collaborated with Nabil Hassein and Sonia Boller to organize the Code Ecologies conference about the environmental impact of technology. As a disability justice organizer, Taeyoon continues to work with the Deaf and Disability community towards accessibility and inclusion.

he/him · website

teacher

Ashley Jane Lewis

Ashley Jane Lewis is a new media artist with a focus on afrofuturism, bio art, social justice and speculative design. Her artistic practice explores black cultures of the past, present and future through computational and analog mediums including coding and machine learning, data weaving, microorganisms and live performance. Listed in the top 100 Black Women to Watch in Canada, her award winning work on empowered futures for marginalized groups has exhibited in both Canada and the US, most notably featured on the White House website during the Obama presidency. Her practice is tied to science and actively incorporates living organisms like slime mould and food cultures (kombucha and sourdough starters) to explore ways of decentralizing humans and imagine collective, multi species survival. Ashley is currently an Artist in Residence at Culture Hub NYC as well as part of the Culture Futures Track in the NEW INC year 7 cohort, an art, design and technology incubator run within the New Museum.

she/her · website · twitter · instagram

How do I apply?

Apply Now

Applications open until Applications closed on June 18, 2020.

You can expect to hear back from us about the status of your application on . Please email us at admissions@sfpc.study with any questions you have.

How much does it cost to attend?

For 10 classes, it costs $1200 + processing fees, for a one-time payment. We also offer payment plans. Participants can schedule weekly or monthly payments of the same amount. First and last payments must be made before the start and end of class. *Processing fees apply for each payment.

SFPC processes all payments via Withfriends and Stripe. Please email admissions@sfpc.study if these payment options don't work for you.

Applicant FAQ

For more information about what we look for in applicants, scholarships, and other frequently asked questions, please visit our applicant FAQ.

Interested in more learning opportunities at the School for Poetic Computation? Join our newsletter to stay up to date on future sessions and events, and follow us on Instagram and Twitter. Support our programming through scholarships. Get in touch over email.