The Visual Archive

Week 14 — December 9
Group Critique

On December 9, we will meet in person. This will be the last opportunity to get feedback on your work. Bring an updated prototype—if possible in the media you are planning to realize it. If you are creating a book, bring a couple of printed pages. If you are designing a website or an exhibition, create a mock-up.

→ Final Deliverable
Your final archive must include:

1 — At least 100 records (images, visuals);
2 — Each record needs to have a caption;
3 — Your introduction needs to be integrated.

Week 15 — December 16
Final Presentation

For our final presentation on December 16 (in person), prepare the following deck/slides accompanying your final project. Presentations should be 5-7 minutes to allow short peer feedback.

—1—
Your Name, Your N-number, Title of your Archive.
—2—
1-2 images of a class experiment that were most inspirational to you. This could also come out of peer instructions.
—3—
1-2 images of a second class experiment that was inspirational to you. This could also come out of peer instructions.
—4— 
A short abstract that introduces your archive. Up to 3 sentences.
—5— 
Who is your audience and what insights will they gain?
—6/7—
Process Images
—8-14 —
A series of slides showing your final implementation. Make sure to have a variety of close ups and wide shots.
—15— Conclusion/Reflection: What did you learn? What is the question you take away from this?

November 25
No class. Fall Break.

December 2: Individuals
Use the spreadsheet in folder week 13 to sign up for a time.

(1) Update your prototype. It should have at least 7 records with captions and should be presented in its final form.

(2) Upload your updated introduction (as a google doc) to the week 13 folder on or before Tuesday, November 30th, 6pm.

Updated schedule:
11/11 Archive Pitch
11/18 Introduction Workshop (remote)
11/25 Fall Break
12/2 Small Groups (remote)
12/9 Studio Week
12/16 Finals

→ Prepare for 11/18

(1) Write an introduction to your archive. You will find guiding questions in the document “Archive Introduction” in the folder week 12. Your introduction should have 200 to 400 words and must be uploaded to the week 12 folder on or before Tuesday, NOV 16th, 6pm. This will allow your peers to read it before Thursday’s class. We will work in small groups, which I will share on Tuesday—you only have to read the introductions of your group members.

(2) Update your prototype: prepare a mock-up of your final deliverable. Will you circulate your archive as a book, a website, an exhibition? Bring sketches, digital collages, and everything that helps explain your plan.

1. Enact a Peer’s Program
You will find the instructions developed by your peers in folder “week 11”. Select one program and enact it. Bring your visual response to class.

2. Pitch Your Archive
Prepare a concise deck with these slides that you can present in 3 minutes and upload it to google drive folder week 11:

1. Your Name, Archive Title
2. Statement:
   I am archiving _______ because I want to _______ in order to ________
3. Methods:
   What do you collect? (pictures of …, pieces of …, scans of …) How do you collect? (every morning I take a picture of …, I use social media to …)
4. Visuals:
   3 sample records (images, …) of your archive with captions
5. Metadata:
   List 10 data items you could collect for each record ranging from basic (date, size, name) to creative/speculative (news headlines, poem, emotions)
6. Precedents:
   1-2 projects that inspire you
7. Audience:
   Who will learn from your archive? What will they learn.
8. Prototype:
   The most up-to-date prototype of your archive. How you will circulate your archive: what medium, early design application.

3. Optional Readings
Skim and decide if these chapters are helpful for your research/process:

1. Sven Spieker, THE BIG ARCHIVE, Art from bureaucracy, Chapter 7: Archive, Database, Photography (google drive)
   
2. Carolyn Steedman, DUST, The Archive and Cultural History, Chapter 4: The space of memory: in an archive. (google drive)

On Nov 4, we will have individual meetings on zoom. Please sign up for a time in the sheet you’ll find in folder week 10. Prepare the following:

Field School Documentation
Create a letter-size research document with ten images of your field trip and a written reflection (one paragraph) on how the experience informs your research and next steps. Upload as PDF to week 9 “Field School Observations.”

Designing Programs
Please take a look at the comments that I added to your instructions/program. Then, enact your instructions and bring the documentation to our meeting. Feel free to refine instructions one more time after you test them.

Archive Prototype
Update your prototype and bring 7 visuals with captions to our meeting.

Penelope Umbrico
Signals Still, 2011 – ongoing
Signals Still, are images of the screens of TVs for sale on Craigslist. As the substrate on which one sees the image, the screen both sifts and registers the result of the sift.
Read more

We will meet in front of Dia Chelsea (537 W 22nd St) at 12.30 to kick off the afternoon and listen to introductions. Due to COVID restrictions, we will visit galleries in small groups or individually and regather at 2 pm in front of Printed Matter (231 11th Ave).

Lucy Raven
Dia Chelsea, 537 W 22nd St

Rob Pruitt
303 Gallery, 555 W 21 St

Marie Tomanova
C24, 560 W 24th St

Tacita Dean: Pantone Pairs
Analia Saban: Line to Thread
Gemini, 535 West 24th, 3rd floor

Leonardo Drew
Pace Prints, 521 W 26th, 4th floor

Endre Tót
Printed Matter, 231 11th Ave

→ Before we go, click through the galleries/exhibitions and find things that resonate with you.
→ Bring a camera/phone and make sure you document the day, including the work inside the galleries and things you come across on your way.
→ Focus on the methodologies of the artists. What would their instructions be if they would give you an assignment to create the next ten images for your archive?
→ At home, retake a look at all images and select the ones that speak to your research inquiry (directly or indirectly) and arrange them on a letter size document.
→ Add a short paragraph to describe in which way these are meaningful to your research process.
→ Export and upload to google drive week 9, “Field School Observations.”

Additional exhibitions recommended or suggested by your peers (not in Chelsea):

Baseera Khan: I Am an Archive
Brooklyn Museum

Countercapture
Miriam Gallery & Bookshop
319 Bedford Ave, Williamsburg

Drift: Fragile Future
The Shed

Field School
→ On OCT 28, we will visit galleries in Chelsea. Until Friday, Oct 22, 5pm:
For our visit to Chelsea on October 28, select two exhibitions that relate to your research interest and post a link to the gallery into this document. Add one sentence how this is relevant to the class or your research. The schedule for Oct 28 will be shared on this website. Use these links to identify exhibitions:
See Saw Gallery Guide — APP
NY Art Beat — Website
ChelseaGalleryMap — Website
GalleriesNow — Website

Designing Programs
→ Karl Gerstner states that designers should not create solutions for problems but programs for solutions. For our last experiment, you will deconstruct a creative practice of your choice and appreciate the challenges of crafting language that instructs somebody else.

→ Asynchronous
Read, Watch, Write

Karl Gerstner
→ Designing Programs, excerpt, google drive & Canvas. Skim!
→ Monograph Review @eye magazine
→ Think program: catalog of the exhibition “designing programs/programming designs” @MoMA

Yoko Ono
→ Grapefruit: A Book of Instructions and Drawings (1964). Follow the link in the article to see an excerpt.

Sol Lewitt
Sol Lewitt devised guidelines and diagrams that allowed for artworks, such as his wall drawings, to be executed by his assistants.
→ Wall Drawing 104 Executed by Eric Doeringer
→ TATE: Studio Visit

→ Prepare
1. Experiment 6: Designing Programs
Develop a program—a set of instructions—that guides a peer to visually respond to their research inquiry & develop new records for their archive. Use this form to submit your set of instructions on or before Oct 27, 6pm.
→ The process can be inspired by the methodology of a specific artist, designer or a general creative practice. Here is an example from Fashion Design.
→ Step 1 needs to address ways to connect to a research topic (“identify an object”, “Visit an environment”, “Find a photograph”, …)
→ The set of instructions needs to include a way to document a “visual response”.
→ Enact your own instructions to test them.

Designing Programmes by Karl Gerstner: More images on Page-Spread

“I like to print on things that already have a past.” (Karel Martens) In other words: combining a visual response to your research inquiry with found imagery creates a dialog with the past (and the future?).

→ Asynchronous
Read, Watch, Write

Karel Martens:
1. His Monograph / some of his work
2. A video about his process
3. Karel Martens on paying attention to the things we don’t see It’s nice That

Other examples:
Occupied Mono
jekyll & hyde

→ Prepare
Experiment 4 — Found Imagery
Use a printing technology of your choice—ranging from potato to risograph—to print visuals and/or words on found printed matter.
     Watch this video introducing Karel Martens work & process.
→ (1) Think about found imagery that relates to your research topic. You can use things you find in the streets, the supermarket, receipts, pages of books, flyers, packaging (…).
→ (2) Develop simple visuals (shapes) or words/sentences that represent your research topic.
→ (3) “Print” them on top of the found imagery. Create at least 3 versions/combinations—a mini series.
→ (4) Take pictures of your work and upload them to google drive week 8.

Archive Prototype
Use this week’s peer feedback to update your archive prototype. Arrange your updated 5 visuals and captions on a letter size landscape document, export as PDF and upload to google drive folder week 8.

So far, we explored how the order of visual elements shapes a narrative, how simple compositions create meaningful communication, and how materiality can impact visual responses. This week, we will focus on color in the context of artistic & scientific practices. 
     Your work for this class will continue in two ways: weekly experiments to explore methods to create visual responses. There is no right or wrong way to conduct these experiments. Observe yourself and identify methodologies that resonate with you.
     At the same time, we will start prototyping your archive to test its concept and strategy.     

→ Asynchronous
Read, Watch, Write

→ Study all links in the right column to learn more about color in the context of artistic/scientific practices.
→ Read: Rudolf Arnheim: Art and Visual Perception—Color, pp 330-337.
→ Skim: Werner’s Nomenclature of Colours (1814).
→ OPTIONAL: If you are interested in a more general introduction to color, take a look at the tutorial “Color for Design and Art” by Jim Krause. Use your newschool account via TNS library to login.

→ Prepare

Experiment 4: Archive ⇄ Color
→ Identify a natural or cultural object, an environment, or a situation that represents your research topic or parts of it.
→ Deconstruct it and identify 12 related colors/shades. All analog and digital processes are allowed.
→ Give a name to each individual color. Everything BUT the name of the color is allowed.
→ Arrange the 12 colors and their names/caption as a “micro-archive” on a letter size canvas/document. Don’t add your name or your research topic to it.
→ Export as PDF and upload to our google drive, week 7.

Archive Prototype
→ Use the feedback from this week’s class to identify 5 records that could be part of your final archive—each should have a caption. Bring to class printed or on screen.

“from earth: everywhere“. Herman de Vries
→ Read this interview with Herman de Vries on designboom — watch the video to learn more about the process (@min6).

Cyanometer
→ Short introduction on Colossal.
→ Learn more at the Royal Society of Chemistry. 
→ New Cyanometer, 2009. Institute of General Theory

“Trying To Remember the Color of the Sky on That September Morning”. Spencer Finch
→ Article @ New York Times by Michael Kirby Smith

Last week, we explored visual means to study physical environments: photography & collaging.
     This (and next) week, we will be looking into materiality and reading surfaces to create a visual response to the physical world.
     Material culture is the aspect of social reality grounded in the objects and architecture that surround people. It includes the usage, consumption, creation, and trade of objects as well as the behaviors, norms, and rituals that the objects create or take part in.
      Here is an introduction: What is Material Culture? by Sophie Woodward on YouTube — it is OPTIONAL, watch it if you have time and specific interest.

Experiment 3 — Material Culture: Rubbings
Before you do anything, make sure to study all links in the right column.
→ Step 1 — Observe 
Use pencil and paper to create rubbings of surfaces or things related to your research inquiry. Document your process.
→ Step 2 — Animate
Use these rubbings to create an animated gif in Photoshop.
Frames: at least 10
Color: black and white
Dimensions: free, stay below 1000px
Tutorial: How-To-Make-An-Animated-Gif
→ Step 3 — Share 
Upload your animated surface investigation (the gif) & 5 images that documents your process to the folder “week 6” on google drive.

Next week (10/7): Individual Meetings VIA ZOOM
Bring to our meeting:
→ Experiment 2 (collages) & 3 (gif)
→ Based on the manifestos we explored in class last week, develop your own mini-manifesto with 5 declarations, intentions, or views to contextualize your research topic.

Optional:
Atlas of Looking at Water
How to start a research inquiry with a simple everyday object: a glass of water.

Reading a surface: Rubbings
→ Rock Drawings by Richard Long
→ Texture Rubbing Collection Sheet by OLIVIA SUH
→ City Rubbings by Alexis Williams
→ Rubbings from Rose City by Christopher Gossett

Time & Visuals
→ Oskar Fischinger: Kreise (excerpt) 
→ Realized with GasparColor| Studie Nr 8. 
→ Fischinger on CenterFor VisualMusic
→ Viking Eggeling: Symphonie Diagonale. Paper cut-outs and tin foil figures were photographed a frame at a time.
→ Eggeling on Monoskop

Animated Gifs
→ Examples: 1 2 3 4 5
→ Tutorial: How-To-Make-An-Animated-Gif

While you are defining your individual research inquiry we will explore experimental ways of visual form-making. These methodologies can inspire the visual direction of your final archive project.
     This week’s experiment takes you out in the streets (if that is safe for you) for field studies and footage gathering.

→ Asynchronous
Read, Watch, Write

→ Experiment 2: Urban Type Collages. Find the password on Canvas.

→ Scott McCloud. Understanding Comics, Chapter 5, pp 118-137.

→ Principles of Visual Language. Kennedy Art Center.

→ OPTIONAL: Beautiful (Then Gone). A short documentary on the work and life of San Francisco designer, Martin Venezky. (14min)

→ Prepare
Experiment 2 — Urban (Type) Collage (It is ok to not include type)

→ Step 1 Identify
Based on your research inquiry, decide for a physical location near to you. A street, a building, a corner, a park, a room, (…)

→ Step 2 Observe
Take a camera (mobile phone) and and spend at least two hours at your location. As a visual journalist, study the environment from different perspectives (zoom in, zoom out) and take pictures of lines & shapes, positive and negative spaces, patterns & textures, and typography & letters. 

→ Step 3 Create
Tutorial: Using Photoshop to create the Urban Type Collages. Get the password from Canvas.
Use your images to create 7 collages that express 7 of the 9 “Principles of Visual Language” discussed in class:
1. 7×7 inches, black on white only.
2. Apply the demonstrated method combining: Image>Adjustment>Threshold and “Multiply” layers.
3. Take into consideration how your seven compositions become a series to represent the same thing in different ways. Even though it is called “Type Collage” not all compositions have to include type.
4. Upload to google drive, week 5, “Urban Collages”.

→ Martin Venezky’s work in the letterform archive.
→ AIGA: Martin Venezky lecture poster.
→ Appetite Engineers: Bordertown

The records (images) of your archive will tell a story. How does the order of things impact the narrative you are intending to convey?
   This week, we will explore ways to arrange visual material and playfully implement elements & principles of visual language.

→ Asynchronous
Read, Watch, Write

Briefing:
Experiment 1: Bilderatlas.
Find it on vimeo—link and passw on Canvas.

Videos:
Lorna Simpson, Studio Visit @TATE
Batia Suter, Parallel Encyclopedia

Article:
Its Nice That, Design, Revolt, Rainbow: the pioneering work of graphic designer Willy Fleckhaus

Readings:
1. This might help with your homework for next week:
Koren, Leonard: Arranging Things, pp. 41-47

2. This might help to think about your research inquiry:
Colomina & Wigley: Are We Human, chapter 1

→ Prepare
Experiment 1 — Bilderatlas
Create 3 plates of a speculative atlas about your research topic:

1. Use all 16 images—your 12 images (you can change these if you need to) + 4 images “stolen” from peers—on each panel.
2. Take time to study the images and arrange them inspired by aspects of your research inquiry. You can also revisit the instructions everyone submitted this week. Only rule: you have to come up with three completely different ways of laying them out.
3. Go back to your research inquiry (or area of interest) and give a title to each plate.
4. Write one sentence about your process for each plate.
5. Both title and process should not be part of the plate.
6. You can use any software or analog process for this assignment.
7. Submission/ bring to class:
   3 plates, each on a tabloid size paper (11 x 17 inches)

Willy Fleckhaus
→ Article on It’s Nice That
→ Spreads on Pinterest

Aby Warburg
→ About the Mnemosyne Atlas (The Warburg Institute)

Lorna Simpson
→ Lorna Simpson Studio
→ Lorna Simpson @TATE
→ Studio Visit @TATE

Additional Introduction to the grid:
→ Ellen Lupton explains the history and usage of the grid
→ An Introduction to Grids and How-to by Andrew Maher

“Seeing per se means thinking about the world and this actually takes place on different levels at the same time,” says Wolfgang Tillmans in an interview for Fondation Beyeler.
     Reflecting on his artistic approach, Arthur Jafa has said that he’s “driven by an impulse to consolidate things that were there, but were dispersed.” (Triple Canopy)
     This week we will expand from one object to 12 images that tell a story. How important are order, sequence, and arrangement?

→ Asynchronous
Read, Watch, Write

Videos:
1. Charles and Ray Eames:
Powers of Ten
2. Wolfgang Tillmans:
Interview Fondation Beyeler
3. Arthur Jafa:
APEX @MoMA (graphic content)
Notebooks

Readings:
1. Research for people who think they rather create, Vis Dirk, pp 25-31.
2. Read all peer responses to the archive screening (you will find them in the week 2 folder).

→ Prepare

1. After reading all peer responses, reach out to at least one of your peer students in an email. You can share a thought, inspiration, ask a question, (…). The content of the message will NOT be shared in class but please cc me (ONLY) on your first email so I can see you initiated a conversation.

2. Select one object from your PECHA KUCHA and find 11 related images. These can be found images, your own, or a mix. Print these 12 images. 4×6 inch (landscape or portrait).

3. After watching/reading this week’s articles, look at your images and come up with ten ways to give them an order. This can be based on content, form, or speculation. Write down each way of organizing as a one-line instruction and add them to the shared document “Visual Narrative” in the week 3 folder of our google drive.

Charles and Ray Eames | Powers of Ten, 1977 from Salon 94 on Vimeo.

Arthur Jafa
→ Notebooks @MoMA
→ Article @NewYorkTimes

Wolfgang Tillmans
→ Installation shots, Zwirner 2015
→ Installation Shots Kunstsammlung Duesseldorf 2013
→ Google Search: Exhibition Set Up

This class explores the relationship between form and content: How is meaning constructed and communicated through visual language?
    Through observing, collecting, analyzing, writing, and form making, students apply design processes involving visual research, concept generation, and craft skills.
     Driven by research interest, you will use digital and analog means to build visual archives. These collections are approached as a resource of critical inquiry and to respond to current socio-political issues.
    So, what is your research interest?

→ Asynchronous
Read, Watch, Write

1. Archive as Method. Screening. (password on Canvas). As a response, summarize your interest in archives in 200 words. Use at least one example from the screening. Add to the google doc in our shared google drive WEEK 2. Submit by 9/8 6pm ECT
2. John Berger: Ways of Seeing, pages 7-10 (min)
3. Hillary Collins: What makes a good research topic?

→ PREPARE
A Pecha Kucha presentation

1. Take pictures of 5 objects that represent your research interest.
2. All 5 objects can represent the same topic or diverse areas of interest.
3. Create a PDF with 5 pages, each page has one object.
4. Upload the PDF to the shared google drive into the folder week 2: PECHA KUCHA
5. Be able to talk about each image for 20 sec.
6. Make a test at home!

→ In the 1920s, the historian of art and culture Aby Warburg (1866-1929) created his Bilderatlas Mnemosyne tracing recurring visual themes and patterns across time. Last fall, an exhibition at HKW Berlin restored the last documented version of this atlas.

→ Archive as inquiry: objects of the everyday. Belgian photographer Barbara Iweins classifies and archives her personal belongings in KATALOG

→ Bernd and Hilla Becher @TATE
→ Hans-Peter Feldmann, Portrait, 1994
→ Herman de Vries, from earth: everywhere @designboom | Journal de Maroc | Branches of trees @hermandevries.org
→ Aby Warburg, Bilderatlas Mnemosyne: Warburg Institute | Exhibition in Berlin this fall @HKW
→ Mario Klingman, X Degrees of Separation
→ Kelly Walters, With a Cast of Colored Stars
→ Mishka Henner, Astronomical
→ Observational Practices Lab: Atlas of Everyday Objects — In the Age of Global Social Isolation