There is another neat art event coming up on Wednesday, March 31 from 1:00 PM - 2:00 PM entitled ‘Digital Manmade: How Technology Is Impacting the Future of Art.’ This event is being led by Shelley Spicuzza, the coordinator of the Digital Fabrication/Imaging Lab. If you wish to attend, you can register for the event by clicking here or at the following link:
https://events.iu.edu/iupui/event/180630-digital-handmade-how-technology-is-impacting-the
The event will feature a tour of the “Think-it, Make-it” lab, which is where students create art using 3D printers. There will be senior students displaying and talking about their work.
This event represents an important direction for contemporary art. As an editor for a literary magazine, I am very invested in the direction of contemporary art. I’ve heard time and again how much everyone’s lives are becoming reliant upon media and technology, and it has already impacted how and where people can learn. But what about art?
We accept 3D art submissions in genesis though they aren’t submitted all that often. Even though they aren’t nearly as popular as paintings and drawings, 3D art forms like woodwork and pottery are still considered art, but what about printed material? Clay and wood require you to work with your hands, and it takes a long time to develop the skills, techniques, and tools necessary to design and sculpt these pieces of art. Some might not consider 3D printed material art because a machine printed it for the artist. However, just like anything else, 3D printers are a tool, and the artist must learn how to use the tool to design what they want.
This is similar to digital art made with painting programs on a tablet. An artist must still make the right brush choice, the right amount of pressure, colors and blending. The basics still apply to digital art. There are only two main differences. The first is a unique layer ability, which allows you to show/hide marks made on that layer, which allows you to easily go back and forth between the background and foreground, instead of working from back to front like most painters do. The second is the undo button, which has the same effect as painting over a mistake and waiting for it to dry, only it takes a second compared to hours.
That represents another challenge to digital artists. Blending is different on a tablet as opposed to a canvas. The paint or brush still needs to be wet in order to blend on a canvas, whereas digital blending is about layering, changing opacity, and selecting the right colors and shades to create the blending effect.
In one sense, traditional and digital art is the same, and in another, they require two very different skill sets. This represents the changing mode of communication, from being strictly written for hundreds of years, to digital. And art, just like poems, stories, and personal essays, is about communicating something. I think that digital art has its easy moments and it’s difficult ones, just like traditional art, and one of the advantages is that it offers more options for people to express their creative side. The advantage of allowing technology to merge with art is that it opens up more outlets for artists, and they can even see some of their paintings become 3D thanks to places like the “Think-it, Make-it” lab. Be sure to check out the tour and what Shelley Spicuzza has to say about the future of art.