Venice, Italy

Visualizing Venice: The Biennale and the City

when 1 June 2015 - 12 June 2015
duration 2 weeks
credits 3 EC

This course will teach a range of digital skills in digital mapping, 3D modeling from ground plans and photos, mobile application development, and time based media authorship to enable participants to engage historical questions with emerging digital tools. As in the previous editions of the workshop, the technologies will be taught through the use of a theme. The summer 2015 theme, “The Biennale and the City” allows for exploration of the history of the Venice Biennale from several perspectives and scales of reference: as a case study in architectural history in the Giardini and the Arsenale; as a set of exhibitions undertaken both on those sites and in more ephemeral sites around the city; as an aggregation of artistic forces hailing from around the world; and as a phenomenon with a profound impact upon the life and culture of the city of Venice itself.

The plan of the course will follow the pattern of previous years.
During the first week of the course students will learn techniques for digital production by drawing upon existing research materials provided by colleagues in the Visualizing Venice team. Each day, students will learn about a different type of digital media production within the context of how that type of reconstruction is typically used in digital art and architectural history.
During the second week, the students will work collaboratively to create projects using the tools they have learned, with the goal of creating high-quality, public-facing research products suitable for a general audience, as well as identifying potential areas to explore in their own future research.

The course duration is 10 days. Students will attend classes in the Digital Lab 5 days per week and will participate in one field trip (during the week-end) at the Venice Biennale premises.
Participants should expect to be engaged full time in these ten days.

Schedule
Students will see examples and will participate in tutorial sessions around the following topics:

Day 1
Introductions and Course Overview
Historical Overview of the Biennale
Computer Orientation

Day 2
Topics in Digital Mapping – Lecture and Examples
Digital Mapping with Google Earth and Web-Based Systems
Historical GIS: Techniques for Vector Data Analysis and Geo-rectification
Data Analysis and Visualization with Tableau

Day 3
Overview of Digital Project Archive Development
Archive-Development with Omeka; Representing Change Over Time with Neatline
Biennale Library visit

Day 4
3D Modeling with Google Sketchup
Photogrammetry Techniques for Object Capture

Day 5
Augmented Reality Application Design with Metaio Creator and Map2App
VirtualWorld Construction with OpenSim

Week-end
Visit Biennale at Giardini and Arsenale

Day 6
Digital Video Production
Project Team Planning

Day 7
Collaborative project work

Day 8
Collaborative project work

Day 9
Collaborative project work

Day 10
Final project work
Presentations to the public

Course leader

Caroline Bruzelius, Mark Olson and Victoria Szabo, Duke University,
Donatella Calabi and Ludovica Galeazzo, Università Iuav di Venezia

Target group

The workshop is designed for participants at the Ph.D - or Post doctoral - level in Interpretive Humanities (including Cultural Patrimony, History of Art, Architecture and Urbanism, History, Geography, Architecture, Archaeology, and other relevant disciplines).
Instruction will be in English of which participants must have an adequate working knowledge.
Maximum number of students: 20

Course aim

Learning outcomes include: familiarity and facility with digital media production tools for digital art and architectural history; awareness of the critical and practical challenges to the fields that digital production techniques pose; understanding of the philosophical and theoretical underpinnings of digital media authorship as an intervention into digital heritage and lived experience of the city.

Credits info

3 EC
An official Duke University/Università Iuav/Venice International University joint Certificate will be issued at the end of the course.
Number of ECTS credits allocated: 3

Fee info

EUR 0: Tuition fees are 1,000 euro+VAT
Successful candidates will receive information about modes of payment once admitted to the program.

Scholarships

Scholarships may become available in the late Spring in order to support tuition, travel, board and accommodation expenses.