This project studies the creative practices of artists and computer scientists/engineers as they work independently to develop novel computing technologies. The goals are to use knowledge gained through this study to both inform computing research as well as to create and evaluate an educational framework for fostering innovation within computing, information science, and engineering (CISE) and science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education. At Georgia Institute of Technology, artists are contributing to the future of computing through the doctoral program in Digital Media. Some of these artists are developing novel computing technologies that parallel work being done in computer science and engineering labs at Georgia Tech. For example, a computer scientist who has developed a wearable sensor network for Navy soldiers is adapting his technology into a SIDS monitoring garment for infants. Separately, an artist is adapting technology she has used in an interactive sculpture to an infant swaddler for SIDS prevention. These common technologies and goals place their work in dialog, allowing direct comparison of creative work practices and outcomes. This project will study pairs of artists and computer scientists/engineers working independently on parallel computing projects to find similarities and differences in their creative work.
This study will pose questions such as ?What common ground may be found between an artist?s and a computer scientist?s prototyping methods?? and ?How do artists and computer scientists incorporate or defy disciplinary training in their approach to innovation?? The study will establish a methodology and framework for understanding the mindsets and work approaches of creative practice in computing, engineering, and art and design. The knowledge resulting from this study will help researchers and educators in computer science, digital media, engineering, and the arts orchestrate creative projects in their own disciplines while incorporating knowledge and practices from other disciplines. In the second year, the study researchers will implement a course at Georgia Institute of Technology?s undergraduate Computational Media program that embodies knowledge gained about creativity across the disciplinary boundaries of art and computer science. This work in curriculum design will contribute in tangible ways to the NSF STEM initiative through publication of both the curriculum and classroom results.
We know that both artists and engineers are creative innovators. What are the similarities and differences in their practices? Could the creative practices of each group inform the other? This project has the following goals: 1) to study the creative work practices of groups of artists and engineers, characterize them, and compare them; and 2) to apply the findings of this study to the formation of a pilot, experimental, project-based, invention course for undergraduates. The idea of involving artists in a study of creativity as it relates to technological innovation may be surprising to some readers. There are important similarities between artists and technology developers, however. Both types of creative professionals imagine, conceptualize, design, and build artifacts and then release them into the world. While artists have always worked with industrial technologies such as paint and pigment chemistry, metalworking equipment, heavy machinery, and kilns, for example, many contemporary artists work with similar materials as technology developers: electronics, computation, robotics, bio-engineering materials, and smart materials. Their work often bleeds into technological development as they create new technologies and new interactions with technologies in the course of their projects. For our study, we found artists and engineering teams working separately to develop similar technologies. We then compared their work practices in depth. For example, an engineer in our study created a special garment for soldiers by making electronic textiles with monitoring and communication abilities. We compared his team’s work practices to those of an artist who created an electronic art installation that collected the heartbeats of visitors. The artist translated the technology from her work into a blanket for infants. This blanket had similar capabilities as the soldier’s garment. Through this study we characterized a spectrum of successful creative practices. At one end of this spectrum we found processes that we call teleological in our reports. In this type of process, the precise form of the technology is designed during the initial stages of the process. This precisely-designed end goal then determines the entire creative process. Findings and emergent results are compared to this design and refined to match it as closely as possible. This type of process has many benefits. It stabilizes a creative project and constrains deviations. It can maximize the probability of a design optimally meeting project requirements, which is important when these requirements include safety and reliability. It also reduces the uncertainty related to the success of the project. On the other end of the spectrum of creative processes, we identified practices that support more exploratory work. In our reports we have named this type of process a stochastic process. In these processes, multiple decision points lead to multiple paths which are explored in parallel. Each path leads to different potential outcomes. While this process is exploratory, it is also informed by the practitioner’s knowledge and experience, and constrained by metaphorical and analogical thinking. These stochastic processes can lead to breakthrough work, and are also more open to incorporating sociocultural content. In the papers we have published from this study, we have characterized these different types of creative processes in detail, as well as their relationship to the uncertainty inherent in the creative process. We also discuss the relationships between these processes and knowledge acquisition. We applied our study findings to the formation of an undergraduate course at our home institution, the Georgia Institute of Technology, in the spring of 2012. This course, entitled "Projects and Practices in Integrated Art and Engineering," was offered to a varied group of undergraduate students from across the engineering disciplines, computing, digital media, and the liberal arts. The primary goal of this pilot, experimental, project-based, invention course was to broaden students’ creative abilities by enabling them to consciously leverage skills, processes, and insights from both the arts and engineering in the pursuit of their creative work. Students were taught about the different types of creative processes and then put these processes into action in their class projects. They were taught that they were not only responsible for designing their invention, but also for designing the creative process that would lead to invention. Students were taught to recognize the relationship between their process and its outcomes. Through our course assessment, we found that not only had students absorbed and put these lessons into practice, but that introducing students to foundational art practices and creative processes enabled them to draw upon broadened creative resources. These creative resources were more foundational than those exercised through strictly problem-solving approaches common in engineering education. This course is currently serving as a contributing model to a new, university-wide, invention course initiative for Georgia Tech freshman and sophomores.
