Studying at IC: Academic Publication Practice and Media Art History with Penesta Dika
Channel: Interface Cultures
Date: 23/08/2021

What can you learn at Interface Cultures? Academic Publication Practice and Media Art History with Penesta Dika!


The current call for applications is open between August 1st and September 1st, 2021. For more information about the department and how to apply, visit http://interface.ufg.at  


This video features Penesta Dika, who works as a freelance curator in Vienna, lectures at the University of Art and Design, Linz and at the University for Business and Technology, Prishtina (XK). The results of her scientific research into digital art, including various artworks that employ virtual reality, AI, and telerobotics have been published in international books, journals and conferences.
She was invited to several collaborations with the Austrian Academy of Sciences, which were published as artistic research. Dika is also the author of the book, Interactive Digital Art. Visual Motifs and their Meaning (Logos, Berlin 2017). www.penestadika.at


About Academic Publication Practice
In Academic Publication Practice, students will learn how to formulate academic texts that can be used as the basis for their master thesis, or as paper submissions to international conferences and scientific journals. This course focuses on refining the students’ individual research, including the creation of suitable research questions, design of the table of contents and sourcing appropriate literature. Students will analyse and discuss various books, journals and other articles from the field of media art and HCI. Use of appropriate research methods such as qualitative / quantitative, design thinking and OIS will be discussed. Students will be trained to use diverse reference styles such as Harvard, APA, Vancouver, etc., and to give appropriate presentations of their research.


About Media Art History
In Media Art History, students will learn about key artworks from the history of media art and their development in relation to scientific and technological progress. The interfaces and interactivity of artworks are focused on by addressing different genres. Media technologies and their usage in art from panoramas to head mounted displays and CAVE, from photography to film, through video, smartphones and apps and so on will be discussed. Students will learn to put contemporary media artworks in a historical, socio-political context, considering the development of diverse media, technologies and general media theories. In addition to works based on current topics such as VR / AR / MR, artificial life and telerobotics, this course also includes discussion about preceding artworks from the earlier fields of computer and oscillograph art, happenings, fluxus and performance.


***

Featured publications:
2017: Penesta Dika. Interactive Digital Art. Visual Motifs and their Meaning, Logos, Berlin. 
2007: Penesta Dika. Die Computerkunst Herbert W. Frankes, Logos, Berlin.2018: Penesta Dika, Eveline Wandl-Vogt, Katja Berger and Jose Luis Preza Diaz, "Food Cultures, Co-Design", interactive digital artwork developed within the programm "The Postdictionary as a living experience: Food Culture experiments" (at the Academy of Sciences in Austria, department of DIgital Humanities), exhibited in: Ars Electronica Festival 2018: "Error - the Art of Imperfection", 6-10 September, Linz, Austria.https://www.oeaw.ac.at/acdh/events/event-detail/the-postdictionary-as-a-living-experience


Featured Exhibitions:
2021: Niki Passath - Telerobotic Painting, curated by Penesta Dika at Galerie Lukas Feichtner, 18th June - 19the July, Vienna, Austria.
2021: Vera Ivanaj, "La Danse du Vivant" (The Dance of Life), curated by Penesta Dika at le pavillon d'accueil, Jardins botaniques du Grand Nancy et de l'Université de Lorraine, 21. Mai - 3rd October, France.
2019 - "Art and Science expressed in Lines: Extended Realities“ with artworks of Martina Zelenika MooN, curated by Penesta Dika at Mz* Baltazar's Laborator, 25. oktober - 1st november, Vienna, Austria. https://martinazelenika.com
2018: Art in Process - Process in Art, International Exhibition with artworks of Cesar Escudero Andaluz (ES), Aura Balanescu (RO), Katja Berger (AT), etc., curated by Penesta Dika. 


Featured works from IC Students:
"Track-track: Let's follow the cat!", a Micro Puppet Theatre for Children by Nomi Sasaki (PE/JP): http://www.nomisasaki.com/tracktrack
Related Thesis: https://phaidra.ufg.at/view/o:2674


"Apnea", interactive and immersive documentary about migrants and the sea by Vanessa Vozzo (IT) https://www.vanessav.net/projects/apnea/
Research paper: https://digitcult.lim.di.unimi.it/index.php/dc/article/view/145


***
Video editing: Indiara Di Benedetto
Graphic design: Juan Pablo Linares Ceballos
Special thanks to Nomi Sasaki and Vanessa Vozzo