Turn your ideas into objects. In this hands-on studio you'll get your hands on the machines in CTC's shop and learn to make with them: 3D printers, pen plotters, vinyl cutters and more. Each week brings a new machine and a new way of working. You'll draw a file and watch a plotter turn it into ink on paper, model a form and print it, and cut graphics you can apply to any surface. Along the way you'll make custom tools, parts and pieces that feed straight back into your drawing, sculpture, textiles, design or whatever you love to make. The course is built for first-year students and beginners, so you can arrive curious and leave with a working toolkit, a pile of experiments, and a sense of what computation can do for an artist or designer.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $300.00

Elective

This elective is focused on HTML, CSS, and javaScript. We will create projects beginning with small, individually made datasets, and move on to text and image corpuses which are human-made and crowdsourced. We will also work with non-human, non-AI "agents”; for example, playing with ways we can map time, calendar, weather data to visual and sensory form. We will consider the web browser as an expressive and dynamic canvas for content, experience, performance, and material experimentation. We will also think critically together about the ethics and challenges of data collection, considering questions of power, scale, and visibility. 

Estimated Cost of Materials: $200.00

Elective

This studio elective focuses on creating digital image-based artworks. Students will be introduced to a wide variety of contemporary artists working between digital imaging, photography, and digital painting — and a range of technical possibilities for making and producing “painterly” digital artworks. Through several short assignments and one final project, students will experiment and then hone in on image-making processes that suit and expand their practices. These projects are complemented by readings and discussions which provide context for contemporary digital art-making: an exciting and ever-changing space for creative work.

Elective

Robots (re)Imagined inaugurates the first formal collaboration between the Rhode Island School of Design, the Brown Arts Institute and Brown School of Engineering —a groundbreaking laboratory where artists, designers, computer scientists, and engineers work side by side to invent new vocabularies for robotics and art.

Robots have long mirrored our collective hopes and anxieties: they clean our homes, assemble our products, patrol our borders, and populate our dreams of the future. We are told they will replace us, liberate us, or destroy us. But what if robots could do something entirely different—something poetic, unpredictable, even transformative? What if they could teach us new ways of being together, of making and thinking across disciplines, of reimagining intelligence itself?

This course is both a studio and an experimental research lab where students will design and program robots that perform beyond utility—machines that move, sense, and communicate in ways that unsettle the boundaries between the technical and the aesthetic. Through readings, discussions, and collaborative projects, students will engage the cultural imaginaries of robotics—its histories, fictions, and futures—while building hands-on systems that test what a robot can be.

Combining the rigor of engineering with the speculative freedom of art and design, Robots (re)Imagined challenges students to make, code, and choreograph robots as expressive, responsive, and collective beings. The semester culminates in a public presentation of interdisciplinary projects that expand the social, ethical, and imaginative possibilities of robotics in the twenty-first century.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $250.00

Lectures: Tues & Thurs 10:30am to 12pm / Lindemann Performing Arts Center, BAI Performance Lab

Labs: Tues (or) Thurs: 6:40 to 9:30pm / ERC 347, ACT Lab

Elective

Introduction to Computation focuses on computational techniques, methods, and ideas in the context of art and design. Studio projects first center on the design of algorithms then shift to involve computer programming and scripting. Critical attention is given to code as a body of crafted text with significant aesthetic, philosophical, and social dimensions, as well as the tension, conflict, and potential possible when computation generates, informs, or interacts with drawings, materials, forms, and spaces. Historical and contemporary works of computational art and design will be presented and assigned for analysis. This course is open to students of all majors and is designed for those with little or no experience in programming. In order to conduct work in this course, students will need a laptop computer. This course fulfills one of two core studio requirements for the CTC Concentration.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $250.00

Major Requirement | BFA Art + Computation

Introduction to Computation focuses on computational techniques, methods, and ideas in the context of art and design. Studio projects first center on the design of algorithms then shift to involve computer programming and scripting. Critical attention is given to code as a body of crafted text with significant aesthetic, philosophical, and social dimensions, as well as the tension, conflict, and potential possible when computation generates, informs, or interacts with drawings, materials, forms, and spaces. Historical and contemporary works of computational art and design will be presented and assigned for analysis. This course is open to students of all majors and is designed for those with little or no experience in programming. In order to conduct work in this course, students will need a laptop computer. This course fulfills one of two core studio requirements for the CTC Concentration.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $250.00

Major Requirement | BFA Art + Computation

Introduction to Computation focuses on computational techniques, methods, and ideas in the context of art and design. Studio projects first center on the design of algorithms then shift to involve computer programming and scripting. Critical attention is given to code as a body of crafted text with significant aesthetic, philosophical, and social dimensions, as well as the tension, conflict, and potential possible when computation generates, informs, or interacts with drawings, materials, forms, and spaces. Historical and contemporary works of computational art and design will be presented and assigned for analysis. This course is open to students of all majors and is designed for those with little or no experience in programming. In order to conduct work in this course, students will need a laptop computer. This course fulfills one of two core studio requirements for the CTC Concentration.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $250.00

Major Requirement | BFA Art + Computation

Introduction to Computation focuses on computational techniques, methods, and ideas in the context of art and design. Studio projects first center on the design of algorithms then shift to involve computer programming and scripting. Critical attention is given to code as a body of crafted text with significant aesthetic, philosophical, and social dimensions, as well as the tension, conflict, and potential possible when computation generates, informs, or interacts with drawings, materials, forms, and spaces. Historical and contemporary works of computational art and design will be presented and assigned for analysis. This course is open to students of all majors and is designed for those with little or no experience in programming. In order to conduct work in this course, students will need a laptop computer. This course fulfills one of two core studio requirements for the CTC Concentration.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $250.00

Major Requirement | BFA Art + Computation

Introduction to Computation focuses on computational techniques, methods, and ideas in the context of art and design. Studio projects first center on the design of algorithms then shift to involve computer programming and scripting. Critical attention is given to code as a body of crafted text with significant aesthetic, philosophical, and social dimensions, as well as the tension, conflict, and potential possible when computation generates, informs, or interacts with drawings, materials, forms, and spaces. Historical and contemporary works of computational art and design will be presented and assigned for analysis. This course is open to students of all majors and is designed for those with little or no experience in programming. In order to conduct work in this course, students will need a laptop computer. This course fulfills one of two core studio requirements for the CTC Concentration.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $250.00

Major Requirement | BFA Art + Computation

Introduction to Computation focuses on computational techniques, methods, and ideas in the context of art and design. Studio projects first center on the design of algorithms then shift to involve computer programming and scripting. Critical attention is given to code as a body of crafted text with significant aesthetic, philosophical, and social dimensions, as well as the tension, conflict, and potential possible when computation generates, informs, or interacts with drawings, materials, forms, and spaces. Historical and contemporary works of computational art and design will be presented and assigned for analysis. This course is open to students of all majors and is designed for those with little or no experience in programming. In order to conduct work in this course, students will need a laptop computer. This course fulfills one of two core studio requirements for the CTC Concentration.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $250.00

Major Requirement | BFA Art + Computation

Introduction to Computation focuses on computational techniques, methods, and ideas in the context of art and design. Studio projects first center on the design of algorithms then shift to involve computer programming and scripting. Critical attention is given to code as a body of crafted text with significant aesthetic, philosophical, and social dimensions, as well as the tension, conflict, and potential possible when computation generates, informs, or interacts with drawings, materials, forms, and spaces. Historical and contemporary works of computational art and design will be presented and assigned for analysis. This course is open to students of all majors and is designed for those with little or no experience in programming. In order to conduct work in this course, students will need a laptop computer. This course fulfills one of two core studio requirements for the CTC Concentration.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $250.00

Major Requirement | BFA Art + Computation

Introduction to Computation focuses on computational techniques, methods, and ideas in the context of art and design. Studio projects first center on the design of algorithms then shift to involve computer programming and scripting. Critical attention is given to code as a body of crafted text with significant aesthetic, philosophical, and social dimensions, as well as the tension, conflict, and potential possible when computation generates, informs, or interacts with drawings, materials, forms, and spaces. Historical and contemporary works of computational art and design will be presented and assigned for analysis. This course is open to students of all majors and is designed for those with little or no experience in programming. In order to conduct work in this course, students will need a laptop computer. This course fulfills one of two core studio requirements for the CTC Concentration.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $250.00

Major Requirement | BFA Art + Computation

This course is a practical and conceptual exploration into electronic sensors, processors and actuators in the context of interactive art and design. Students will turn everyday objects into ambient interfaces or "responsive systems" that respond to the conditions of the human body, data networks, and the environment. Contemporary works of art and design - from kinetic sculpture and sound art to installation, architecture and product design - will be examined through readings and presentations. Open source hardware (Arduino) and software (Processing) will be taught along with the fundamentals of electronic circuitry. Emphasis is given to the development of creative projects (individual or collaborative), followed by an iterative implementation process (planning, prototyping, testing, analyzing, and refining). The course is structured around a series of tutorials and exercises, culminating in a final project. Students also present work-in-progress and prototypes during class reviews to receive qualitative feedback from the class and the instructor. Participants will engage with physical computing conceptually and technically in their studio work and are encouraged to leverage their individual backgrounds to excel in the respective context. Prior experience with electronics and programming is recommended but not required.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $200.00

Major Requirement | BFA Art + Computation, BFA Sound

This course is a practical and conceptual exploration into electronic sensors, processors and actuators in the context of interactive art and design. Students will turn everyday objects into ambient interfaces or "responsive systems" that respond to the conditions of the human body, data networks, and the environment. Contemporary works of art and design - from kinetic sculpture and sound art to installation, architecture and product design - will be examined through readings and presentations. Open source hardware (Arduino) and software (Processing) will be taught along with the fundamentals of electronic circuitry. Emphasis is given to the development of creative projects (individual or collaborative), followed by an iterative implementation process (planning, prototyping, testing, analyzing, and refining). The course is structured around a series of tutorials and exercises, culminating in a final project. Students also present work-in-progress and prototypes during class reviews to receive qualitative feedback from the class and the instructor. Participants will engage with physical computing conceptually and technically in their studio work and are encouraged to leverage their individual backgrounds to excel in the respective context. Prior experience with electronics and programming is recommended but not required.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $200.00

Major Requirement | BFA Art + Computation, BFA Sound

This course is a practical and conceptual exploration into electronic sensors, processors and actuators in the context of interactive art and design. Students will turn everyday objects into ambient interfaces or "responsive systems" that respond to the conditions of the human body, data networks, and the environment. Contemporary works of art and design - from kinetic sculpture and sound art to installation, architecture and product design - will be examined through readings and presentations. Open source hardware (Arduino) and software (Processing) will be taught along with the fundamentals of electronic circuitry. Emphasis is given to the development of creative projects (individual or collaborative), followed by an iterative implementation process (planning, prototyping, testing, analyzing, and refining). The course is structured around a series of tutorials and exercises, culminating in a final project. Students also present work-in-progress and prototypes during class reviews to receive qualitative feedback from the class and the instructor. Participants will engage with physical computing conceptually and technically in their studio work and are encouraged to leverage their individual backgrounds to excel in the respective context. Prior experience with electronics and programming is recommended but not required.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $200.00

Major Requirement | BFA Art + Computation, BFA Sound

What does it mean to create art and design in a moment when technological systems are rapidly reshaping culture and society? Transformative systems such as artificial intelligence are reconfiguring how information is produced, circulated, and consumed, sometimes creating destabilizing forces such as deepfakes that threaten our shared realities while also offering novel materials for experimentation. In parallel, approaches such as speculative design and critical making allow artists and designers to probe these systems, imagine alternative technological futures, and test possibilities that extend beyond existing paradigms. How artists respond to this cultural inflection point will be decisive in shaping our technological future.

This course will unfold in two parts each week: a seminar-style discussion followed by a conversation with a visiting artist, designer, or technologist. In the first session, students will engage with readings and case studies related to the upcoming guest, situating their work in broader cultural, technological, and historical contexts. In the second session, students will meet the guest lecturer, who will provide a unique perspective on how artists and designers are actively producing work that both critiques current conditions and proposes new directions for rethinking the relationship between culture and technology. Our cultural reality is increasingly constructed through the technological interfaces we inhabit, so how will the artists of today and the students of this course choose to shape it?

Estimated Cost of Materials: $100.00

Elective

This is a course about artists as collectors, collecting strange, wonderful stuff, and turning it into art. Each week you’ll experiment with gathering and organizing material from the world, recording sounds, photographing textures, scanning found objects, and then remix them into your own creative work. Along the way, you’ll get opportunities with hands-on with tools like audio recording, scanners, cameras, various printers, 3D and fabric printing, digital embroidery, and creative software such as Photoshop, Premiere, and 3D software. You’ll experiment with different ways to capture and organize your material. We’ll look at artists who treat archives as art, explore how collections shape culture, and invent new workflows that spark ideas. By the end, you’ll have your own evolving toolkit, an “asset library”, a cabinet of curiosity, to fuel any kind of work: video, sound, games, installation, design, painting, sculpture, collaborations, experiments, whatever you dream up.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $100.00

Elective

Students will create, document, or collect time-based change and use the data generated as the foundation for a creative project.  Creating change could include working with smart or reactive materials, natural phenomena or interventions.  Documenting change could cover both lens-based formats but also a range of computational sensors or analog solutions.  Collection could source change from archival, digital, or generated existing datasets. With each method, the temporality collected will be refined to patterns, structures, or chaos that inform the final project. Students will explore assembly options in 2D or 3D imagery, data materialization, sonification, performance, algorithmic, or nature/science interactions. Hundreds of examples from both science and art, early to contemporary practices, will be presented and discussed.  Final projects can exist in any media but must contain the structure of the sourced data embedded in the work. A laptop is required.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $250.00

This course is open to all students.

Elective

In their book Games: Agency as Art, C. Thi Nguyen identifies the game as a unique artform, which allows designers to work with agency as medium to mold a player’s range of possible behaviors. In this class we will think more broadly about agency and what it means within virtually mediated realities. We will draw from and add to our personal toolboxes to create bespoke assets for 3D virtual environments, primarily using the open source 3D modeling software, Blender. We will use games engines such as Unity to run simulations, animate avatars and prototype game mechanics. We will explore speculative fiction as a framework for building worlds we might want to live in. Finally we will prod at the container of a game, experimenting with the ways in which games are experienced within a variety of contexts, from the living room to the theater or the gallery.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $250.00

Elective

In this course, students make games from the first week through a series of game jams, building and playtesting a playable game in each one. Students explore game design through the tools and constraints of pixel art. Working within the disciplines of programming game mechanic logic, game art production, and composing 8-bit music will require a broad and technical approach. No prior coding or art experience is required.

Programs like GB Studio for game design, game logic, and visual programming, Aseprite for sprites and animation, as well as music trackers for sound and music production will all be covered. By managing hardware limitations, game design scope, and sprite-based design, students will explore the capabilities of this inherently constrained medium. These efforts will culminate in a playable game printed on a physical Game Boy cartridge that can be played on actual hardware.

This course will also situate this work within the history of pixelated art: A) before video games through works of textiles, mosaics, and other grid-based design tools throughout art history; B) during the birth of video games as a tool of efficient processing and clear communication; and C) up to the present day as an accessible tool of game design for both beginners and professionals in modern video games.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $250.00

Elective