Theory of Technological Media

Language of instruction:  Hungarian

Course description:
The objective of this course is to provide a general overview of the media which are put to artistic application and taught at the department, creating a broader context for their extended use and research. The issues in question are: images through technology, audio-visual processing, the relationship of the image and writing, photography, film, video, computer (including issues of networks, multimedia, virtual reality). Importantly, the instruction is based on a careful analysis of the current philosophical background of the issues and the stimulating demonstration of the theoretical field. This course focuses upon theoretical ramifications and the presentation of their transformation in time, while the histories of the various media are dealt with by the course "General Media History."

General list of topics (the actual courses offered in a semester are tied in to one or more of these):

• Image theory, the relationship of the image and writing, visual and acoustic transformations
• Light and theories of light, light in art and nature
• Time in the arts and in the history of ideas
• Space, matter, form and motion: composition and division
• Science and art
• Mass media: Newspapers, radio and television
• Media theory and media criticism
• Audio-visions (S. Zielinski)
• Video as an alternative
• Computers: the information revolution
• Interactivity, new communication technologies

Topics for exams:

• Optical and aural transformations before the advent of photography. Perspectives, camera obscura, optical innovations, duplication and communication technologies
• The invention of photography and its effect on the arts
• Technological and scientific developments in the 20th century, with special regard to communication technologies and their impact on the arts
• The birth of film, and the archaeology of motion picture
• The art of the 1920's, with special regard for the Bauhaus
• Significant oeuvres of the 20th century (Duchamp, Malevich, Moholy-Nagy, Kassák, Beuys, Erdély etc)
• Electronic image and sound: the development and differences of digital and analogue technologies
• The emergence of video art and its relation to television
• The avant-garde in the 1960's, the meanings of the concept of media and its various applications. Intermedia and multimedia
• "Late modern perspectives" - The most significant theoretical trends of the past three decades, its authors, theories and the changing definitions of the arts
• Methods of art analysis. Possible approaches to media art
• The development and features of networks.

Bibliography: Compulsory readings in Hungarian; suggested readings in Hungarian.