Robert W. Sweeny

Lines of Sight in the "Network Society": Simulation, Art Education, and a Digital Visual Culture

Contemporary societies are in the process of developing digital technological networks that simultaneously result in their transformation. The operations of networked computer systems, based in forms of simulation, have shifted general notions of visuality within a visual culture. Practices in art education that address these contemporary developments should be able to respond to the current forms of visuality being created in a variety of educational spaces—both actual and virtual. In this article, I identify three theoretical ‘lines of sight’ that represent contemporary forms of vision related to the use of networked digital technologies—specifically the Internet. These critical aesthetic tactics of individuals and collectives point to possibilities for adapting similar approaches in art educational spaces, making connections between curriculum and pedagogy, new media theory, and contemporary sociology, forming the matrix of a digital visual culture.

Scopic Regime Change: The War of Terror, Visual Culture, and Art Education

This study examines visual dimensions and pedagogical repercussions of the war of terror. Iconographies of threat and prophylaxis are explored through a discussion of the actuarial gaze and the terr(or)itorialization of the visual field. Specific visual culture fallout from the war of terror is examined, including artistic responses and educational (ir)responsibilities and possibilities. Technologies of forgetting and artistic and pedagogical strategies of remembering are also considered. The essay concludes with an examination of implications and possible future directions for contemporary art education in a post-9/11 world.

This Performance Art Is for the Birds: Jackass, 'Extreme' Sports, and the De(con)struction of Gender

Many challenges currently face art educators who aim to address aspects of popular visual culture in the art classroom. This article analyzes the relationship between performance art and the MTV program Jackass, one example of problematic popular visual culture. Issues of gender representation and violence within the context of Reality TV and ‘extreme’ sports will be analyzed, with the intent of questioning the pedagogical limitations and possibilities of such topics within the field of art education, in order to provide art educators with related critical pedagogical strategies.

Complex Digital Visual Systems

This article identifies possibilities for data visualization as art educational research practice. The author presents an analysis of the relationship between works of art and digital visual culture, employing aspects of network analysis drawn from the work of Barabási, Newman, and Watts (2006) and Castells (1994). Describing complex network dynamics as they relate to digital image data sets, the author explores notions of influence and interpretation through the language of network analysis and suggests opportunities for art education taking place within complex digital visual systems.

Pixellated Play: Practical and Theoretical Issues regarding Videogames in Art Education.

Videogames represent one of the fastest growing and most influential forms of contemporary visual culture. In this article, the author looks to five aspects of current videogames: perspective, interactivity, interface, narrative, and time and movement. Each of these videogame modalities is analyzed as related to a wide range of popular media, including film and new media. Art educators are provided with specific suggestions for incorporating aspects of videogames in practice, questions that point to the problematic nature of many videogames, as well as general theoretical directions for future research.

Visual Culture of Control.

Current discussions regarding the notion of visual culture in art educational practice center the actions of the viewer as participant within the networks of visuality common in many contemporary societies. Surveillance technologies and techniques shift this notion of participation from active to passive, from seeing to being seen. This article explores the relationship between the gaze as structured by art educational practice and contemporary forms of surveillance, looking to theoreticians who analyze power as it is formed within complex visual networks.

Participatory Youth Culture: Young Children as Media and MOC Makers in a Post-millennial Mode

This chapter looks to early childhood learning that is informed by and presented through an understanding of the convergence of contemporary networked digital technologies and young children’s digital lives as media makers. Very young learners have at their disposal a vast media landscape that, when compared with earlier media forms, allows for unprecedented opportunities for making, engagement, and interaction. These opportunities are often accompanied by challenges to notions of creativity, originality, and appropriateness for young children. Online, fan-based media also allow for forms of collaboration between children and adults that challenge traditional modes of mentorship, parenting, and pedagogy. As artists and art educators who work with young children and youth, the authors present observations and analyses of young children working in out-of-school settings, creating traditional artwork, composing digital games, and constructing interactive vignettes that can inform the in-school practices of educators in multiple disciplines who work with young children.

Makerspaces and Art Educational Places

In this article I outline the theoretical underpinnings of the maker movement, and I provide the reader with a detailed analysis of how these theories relate to current discussions of making in art education. The primary research concern is to compare the implementation of digital technologies in art educational practices with the claims currently being made regarding the educational benefits of the maker movement in educational spaces. The maker movement aligns with do-it-yourself approaches to making, as well as current interests in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics fields, and, as such, might be relevant to contemporary art educational practices. In the conclusion, I identify a number of suggestions that are intended to assist researchers and teachers who are concerned with digital technologies and how they might disrupt the field of art education.

Posthumanist Movement Art Pedagogy: Geolocative Awareness and Co-Figurative Agency With Mobile Learning

Mobile learning from a posthumanist critical perspective is the co-figuration of learner with geolocative mobile devices that blurs boundaries of the networked body. In this study, four art education researchers explore geolocative co-figurative possibilities of mobile learning. The authors theorize co-figurative agency and heighten awareness of the importance of sociospatial relationships afforded by the current milieu of networked geolocative knowledge to arts pedagogy. Through analysis of case studies of art practice, a new theoretical concept called posthumanist movement art pedagogy is developed to investigate movement as a posthumanist art practice, enacting agency through mobile data co-figuration within spaces of geolocative awareness. Case studies concentrate on mobile new media art utilizing photography, gamification, Global Positioning System drawing, and data collection/broadcasting. Impacts on the field of art and education focus on movement as being co-figured with the body and geolocation data as sites for potential transformation, embodiment, play, and data-identity constructions.