On February 28, Critical Media Practice convened a workshop on Artistic Practice in the Research University, hosted by the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. The workshop brought together faculty and graduate students from six research universities with innovative programs uniting artistic practice and scholarly inquiry: CMP and MetaLAB at Harvard; the Centre for Creative Research in Sound Arts Practice at University of the Arts, London; Film & Digital Media, University of California, Santa Cruz; the SACRe program, Université Paris Sciences et Lettres; Critical Media Practices, University of Colorado, Boulder; and the Centre for Research Architecture, Goldsmiths, University of London.
Faculty and graduate students from each school informally presented about their programs’ structure, approach, student body, and projects. Together we explored the strengths and challenges we face in this field and what we have to learn from one another, including:
- How does students’ artistic work shape their scholarly research and vice versa – or does the artmaking benefit from separation from the scholarship?
- What are strong examples of practice-based research methods that inform theoretical investigations?
- How does artistic practice garner legitimacy in fields dominated by text?
- How do we reconcile the very different criteria for measuring the success of art vs. scholarship?
- What are the opportunities for us to collaborate as institutions?
We concluded with a roundtable discussion. Some of the memorable points that emerged were the opportunity to promote “rigorous and non-arbitrary ambiguity” together (our work is necessarily ambiguous, while universities often attempt to operate unambiguously); the precarity of labor within the increasing neoliberalism of the university – and the university as a potentially radical space; ways of doing as ways of knowing, or “doing knowledge”; the interstitial spaces between theory and practice; whether our programs are defined in opposition to MFA programs capitalized by the art world; and acknowledging the hierarchy/patriarchy of an art market that super values the role of the artist genius compared to science’s more recognized collaborations.
We look forward to staying in touch with our colleagues in the coming years. Thank you to the Radcliffe Institute for supporting our fruitful discussions!