Studio Pedagogy For Situated Learning In The Culturescape
Symposium:
Session Title:
- Interdisciplinary Teaching and New Media Arts
Presentation Title:
- Studio Pedagogy For Situated Learning In The Culturescape
Presenter(s):
Venue(s):
Abstract:
The paper will present educational insights gained from developing studio pedagogy for situated learning in relation to emerging creative technologies. The Culturescape study abroad program – which has been conducted annually since 2009 – has been designed with a focus on exposing tertiary-level art & design students to the potentials for communication experiences that come into existence through combining site-specific, location-based practices with digital image-making and creative technology. Undertaken as an intensive and immersive studio over a five-week residency period at the Monash University Centre in Prato, Italy, participants are given the unique opportunity to develop individual and collaborative projects that respond creatively to their experiences of place, space and community. According to Lave and Wenger (1991), situated learning acknowledges how the process of knowledge co-constructed or creation occurs in context and is embedded within a particular social or physical environment. Through the integration of fieldwork in and around Tuscany, complemented by seminar critiques and studios, students were encouraged to explore their studio practices through designing creative content for emerging location-based practices, including a particular focus on “geo-cinema” – which according to artist Pete Gomes (2004) is “the new cinema of commuting, variable and embbeded in motion, locations, and fluidity”. The text and its accompanying presentation will thoroughly document course structure, creative outcomes of both directed and selected self-initiated coursework and reflectively evaluate the course’s pedagogical aspects and student experience.
Jean Lave and Etienne Wenger (1991) Situated Learning: Legitimate peripheral participation. Cambridge: University of Cambridge Press.
Pete Gomes (2004), Being On Location: The beginnings of ‘Geo-Cinema’ and ‘Place Code’.
