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Digital media steps out
Since the turn of the century, the realm of digital media has seen unprecedented growth. No longer trapped behind a computer desk to enjoy a digital experience, users today are presented with a multitude of opportunities, and a front seat role in determining how these virtual experiences may enhance their reality. And as the world embraces the growing capabilities of the technology supporting these experiences – as illustrated by the growing popularity of multifunctional tools such Apple’s iPhone - a new generation of media artists are challenging our perceptions of the role of digital technologies in our lives, and re-defining our cultural and social experiences in the virtual world. According to Vince Dziekan, Head of the Department of Multimedia and Digital Arts at Monash Art & Design, this shifting focus of digital media towards innovation with creative technologies is what makes the discipline an exciting area of study for students and researchers alike. “There’s definitely a place for IT-oriented multimedia courses, but I think the way that digital media has evolved within an art and design context makes the program at Monash quite unique. The connectivity of multimedia and digital arts, not only with other disciplines within the Faculty, but also within the broader community, makes it a really exciting space to be working in,” Vince said. It is within this cultural arena that the shift is best illustrated, with multimedia practitioners vying for public art commissions alongside more traditional
art forms, such as sculpture and painting. Public art installations such as ‘Colony’ at the Digital Harbour precinct at Docklands (see p15) and VOLUME, an installation by United Visual Artists as part of recent The Light In Winter festival at Federation Square, typify the evolution of the art form, and its embrace by the public. “People engage with digital media in everyday situations, and it has become part of the vernacular. Its therefore not surprising that the public responds to innovation in the field, whether in a professional, social or cultural context,” Vince said. For Monash Art & Design, this evolution has meant that students now enter the Faculty with wide ranging skills and ideas which make the undergraduate course a hotbed of creativity. “Students walking in the door now have a good solid set of software skills, which means we no longer have to spend as much time teaching the technical side of things, and we can concentrate on developing the ideas and concepts which take digital media to a new level.” Vince also believes the rapid advances in technology are creating new opportunities for digital artists and designers to explore the potential of their craft. “We’ve certainly seen an acceleration in the development of mobile technologies, which has opened up possibilities in media communication.
People are no longer confined to experiencing digital content from behind their desk, so artists and designers can now exploit the spatial features of specific sites and locations.” Vince’s own interests in the spatial context of digital media forms part of his current research. In 2008, he presented a paper at ISEA2008, the International Symposium on Electronic Art, discussing the spatial relationship between digital media and exhibition space. “One of the bigger issues in digital art research at the moment is how you negotiate around the issue of locatedness. How does digital media operate in specific environments such as public exhibition spaces? How can digital content be accessed in a more mobile way, and interacted with on portable devices?” This topic also forms the basis of a new study abroad program Vince will run in Prato, Italy later this year. “Students from across the Faculty will engage with concepts associated with locative media through exploring site specificity. Using a range of digital media, the participants will be producing creative content for mobile devices in order to move away from the computer lab to situate their projects in other environments.”
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