Art + Technology | BFA

Artists in California have been combining art and technology for many decades. These artistic forms of investigation are more relevant and compelling than ever before, particularly in the Bay Area with its culture of technological innovation, emphasis on social media, and DIY ethos. Students in the Art and Technology major at SFAI learn the technical, conceptual, historical, and theoretical skills needed to produce contemporary art using technological forms such as time-based and networked media, digital media, audio, programming, and electronics.

• Students gain historical and contemporary knowledge of the ways that artists use and have used technologies within their artistic practice, and familiarity with the theoretical frameworks brought to bear on the discourse surrounding such practices.
• Students acquire knowledge of concepts, skills, and techniques needed to produce art works that utilize digital, interactive, networked, and/or electronic media.
• Students gain an understanding of the characteristics and capabilities of various technologies (hardware and software); their appropriateness for particular expressive, functional, and strategic applications; their positions within larger contexts and systems; and their influences on individuals and society.
• Students acquire an understanding of concepts central to art works that utilize technologies, including narrative, duration, networked information, kinetics, and interactivity.
• Students demonstrate the ability to collaborate with others, both from artistic and other disciplines.
• Students demonstrate the ability to develop an advanced body of artwork utilizing technology that sustains an original concept.

• Structural Drawing/Design Visualization
• Internet Tools and Concepts
• Smarter Art Design for Smart Devices
• Active Wearable Objects
• Typography: Context and Practice
• Sonic City Sound Lab: Sound, Bodies, and the City
• Rethinking the “Artist”: The Case for Collaborative Practice