“The Technological Imperative of Contemporary Art & Design Studies” by Barry

When the leading schools of art and design were built before the turn of the last century, great care was taken to ensure proper light exposure, flexibility of space, and durability of structure in their art studios. As a result, these studio spaces have been remarkably successful in supporting the fundamental, traditional needs of art and design students. But the fundamental needs of art students have radically changed. In addition to traditional media and their associated tools, fundamental art and design studies now include new media and their associated digital technologies.

As the nature of art and design studies has evolved, so have their support requirements. Issues such as light exposure are less important than the need for sophisticated networking, bandwidth, throughput, electrical capabilities, and multifunctional usage. Today, these evolving needs apply to virtually all core creative arts studies, yet most schools are ill-equipped to satisfactorily address them.

Placing computers in a room and plugging them into a wall does not constitute a meaningful approach to modern creative arts education. We need to re-examine, re-define, and re-design the appropriate environments for modern creative arts studies— and we need to find models and sources for funding them.