Adding Artifacts

Adding Artifacts

What do you see when visiting the artist or composer’s studio, designer’s workshop, reporter’s office or scientist’s lab?  In addition to finished creative products, method and process are physically present.  The most apparent are elements of production- tools, instruments, or technology.  Iterations, drafts and experiments are visible.  Journals and sketchbooks hold ideation.  Finally there is documentation of research- a procedure mapped in a diagram, a graph of findings, taped-up image reproductions, and collections of inspirational things.  This visual evidence of the full creative process can be included within the LP Workspace.     

Types of Artifacts    

Sketchbook, Notebook and Journal Documentation

Sketchbooks, notebooks and journals are places to ideate work or collect observation.  They are often used ritualistically, daily or weekly, and as such they track over time. These vital tools of learning are paramount to many New School courses and can be used in conjunction with the LP Workspace.  Slideshows of book pages, or videos, are excellent ways to archive this work in digital form. 

Documentation of Learning Process and Activity

The procedure of making or researching often determines the outcome.  This process often takes place outside of class.  Documenting procedure on the LP Workspace is beneficial.  Visitors to the LP Workspace are able to see the work unfold and can call-out key moments.  Makers/ Performers/ Researchers also begin to step outside of themselves and notice their own methods.  Both “ah-ha!” moments and challenges deserve documentation.

Materials Research and Curation

Collection is a process of gathering materials.  New School projects often involve the element of collection- be it objects from nature, swatches of color, discarded urban waste, sound or sentence fragments.  These are elements that can be documented in photography, video or audio and added to the LP Workspace.  Other common research comes by collecting examples of inspiring contemporary and historical art, design, and music.  The use of galleries, slideshows and captions on the LP Workspace requires curating.  Documenting relationships between similar and seemingly dissimilar elements makes meaning.

Lecture Response

Many New School courses are lecture-based and involve the direct delivery of information to students via faculty presentation.  Actively engaging with this content on the LP Workspace builds understanding and connection to the lecture.  A lecture response can certainly take the form of response writing.  However the dynamic potential of the LP Workspace can be mined.  A response to a lecture on music history might use audio to compare and contrast several treatments of the piece.  After a lecture on character depiction, notebook observations of everyday interaction may be kept.  An art or design history lecture may inspire a curated gallery of contemporary images related to the historical works.  Photography of traffic flow in the city might be a response to a lecture on urban planning.