FCAT Research and Teaching Forum 2022

Bio: Jim Bizzocchi is Professor Emeritus in the School of Interactive Arts and Technology. Jim's research interests include the evolving aesthetics of the digital moving image, the creation of generative video-sequencing systems, and the design of interactive narrative. He has published in a wide variety of academic conferences, journals and book chapters. Jim is a recipient of Simon Fraser University’s Excellence in Teaching Award. He is a practicing video artist, producing both linear and computationally-generative video art works that complement his scholarly writing. His video art has been shown extensively in a number of festivals, galleries, and juried exhibitions throughout the world. Jim can often be found ski-touring or hiking in BC’s Coastal Mountains.  https://ambientvideo.org/

Abstract: Research, Art, and Teaching can inform and support each other.  At SFU, and especially in SIAT and FCAT, artistic practice is seen as a legitimate research activity. Certainly in my own work, my research and my artwork have significant conceptual and practical overlap.  I am fortunate that my teaching assignments and experiences have formed a third leg of support for my professional practice.      In the formal context of SFU policies/procedures, research and artistic practice are the most directly connected of the three legs.  The SIAT Tenure and Promotion criteria recognize this explicitly, using concepts and language my School initially borrowed from the SCA Tenure and Promotion guidelines.  My own practice while at SFU has benefited directly from this formal connection of Research and Art.  Some of this takes the form of career benefit – my artistic practice has been recognized as a research activity.  This has been the case from the time of my initial hire through all the subsequent stages of tenure and promotion, including my final promotion to Emeritus Professor.  More significantly, my everyday practices of scholarly discourse and of artistic creation have informed and supported each other throughout my SFU career.      Teaching is the third leg of this triangle.  I’ve been lucky to have teaching assignments in the same domains in which I practice my research and art: moving image production, game design, digital media poetics, and narrative across media.  This means my course design and my day-to-day teaching have been supported by both my scholarship and my art creation.  At the same time, the things I have learned from my teaching practice and from my students have provided insight and depth to both of my other practices.

Bio: Building on his deep expertise in Virtual Reality and Human-Computer Interaction, Dr. Stuerzlinger is a leading researcher in Three-dimensional User Interfaces. He got his Doctorate from the Vienna University of Technology, was a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Chapel Hill in North Carolina, and professor at York University in Toronto. Since 2014, he is a full professor at the School of Interactive Arts + Technology at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, Canada. His work aims to gain a deeper understanding of and to find innovative solutions for real-world problems. Current research projects include better 3D interaction techniques for Virtual and Augmented Reality applications, new human-in-the-loop systems for big data analysis (Visual Analytics and Immersive Analytics), the characterization of the effects of technology limitations on human performance, investigations of human behaviors with occasionally failing technologies, user interfaces for versions, scenarios, and alternatives, and new Virtual/Augmented Reality hardware and software. https://vvise.iat.sfu.ca/people/wolfgang-stuerzlinger

Abstract: Technology increasingly employs unreliable systems as a central means to interpret input. Common examples include text input in mobile devices or lane departure detection in cars. This reliance exposes a fundamental problem – people do not generally understand the underlying systems, and seemingly small system or human errors can lead to potentially disastrous consequences. While technical improvements partially address this, recent research in my group pursues a complementary approach through a better understanding of human interaction with, and new user interface (UI) technologies for, unreliable systems. I present insights gathered from our analysis of human behaviours around occasionally failing systems, new methods that reduce errors caused by auto-correction and prediction algorithms, and close with an outlook for future work. 

Bio: William Odom is an Assistant Professor in the School of Interactive Arts and Technology at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, Canada. He leads a range of projects in exploring longer-term human-data relations, slow interaction design, and methods for developing the practice of Research-through-Design. He was previously a Fulbright Scholar in Australia, a Banting Fellow in Canada, and a Design United Research Fellow in the Netherlands.

Abstract: The convergence of social, cloud and mobile computing has created a world in which people generate, access, manipulate, and share personal digital data at larger scales and faster rates than ever before. From digital photo albums to online music streaming services, these new technologies have enabled people to create vast archives of digital data that capture their life experiences. These technological trends raise complex questions for the design community as we critically look to the future and consider their longer-term implications. As archives continue to grow, how will people live with their personal data in ways that support their evolving practices and understandings of self as they change over time? What kinds of qualities should designers consider in crafting a longer-term place for computational things in everyday life?     Early research has begun to show that designing technologies that intentionally slow down interactions with digital artifacts can make them more valuable parts of everyday life. However, the conceptualization of ‘slowness’ as a design approach is underdeveloped and exemplars of how it can be translated into design strategies are sparse. Research through Design (RtD) is an emerging research method in interaction design that grounds theoretical investigations through the research‐creation activity of design. The design artifacts produced through RtD offer exemplars of how theoretical concepts can be articulated and refined through the creative practice of design. In this way, RtD offers concrete ways to surface new knowledge on how complex social issues like digital overload can be reframed and approached.     Over the past several years, I have investigated how the slow technology design philosophy might offer a critical framing for inquiring into the research questions posed above — and how slow technology itself could be further theoretically developed. In this talk I will draw on examples from this trajectory of work to describe how theoretical ideas of slowness were advanced through practice.

Bio: John Maxwell is Associate Prof & Director of the Publishing Studies at SFU. His research has focused on the cultural trajectory of personal and educational computing, the history of publication technologies, digital genres, and the evolution of scholarly communications.  https://popjournal.ca/about

Abstract: Just before the pandemic began we announced the launch of *Pop! Public. Open. Participatory,* a "post-digital journal of the public humanities." Pop! would be an open-access, online journal with a beautifully designed print edition, circulated at conferences and events to drive readership and engagement among humanities scholars and beyond. The pandemic squashed live events and by extension our circulation plan too, but it evolved into a prototype MVP for a scholar-led OA journal: produced on simplest-possible tech to explore what is truly essential in an OA journal. In 2022, Pop! is now exploring becoming an 'overlay journal' for the Canadian HSS Commons project, moving towards an alternative model for peer-review, credentialing, and readership in a 'disciplinary commons' space. Pop!'s agility has been a function of its small scale, minimal funding requirements, and mission-driven ethic.

Bio: Rob Kitsos is an interdisciplinary dance artist with an international profile focusing on  collaboration and performance. As a professor of dance in the School for the Contemporary Arts, a consistent part of his work has been designing courses that bring together dance, theatre, music, visual art, and design -testing new approaches and established methods for communicating and cocreating between performing arts disciplines. As a maker, Kitsos has created over 100 original performance works at international festivals in the United States, Canada, Lisbon, Barcelona, France, Italy, Switzerland, Germany, Netherlands, Venezuela and Hong Kong. Rob lives and works on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations. Robkitsos.com

Abstract: Exploring movement through disciplines outside of dance, Kitsos will share teaching and research projects including a database of tools for collaboration, score-based performance research and a new direction in approaches to movement creation through a material-led practice.

Bio: Gillian Russell is an Assistant Professor in design at Simon Fraser University’s School of Interactive Arts and Technology, Vancouver, Canada. Working at the intersection of critical design, anthropological futures, and narrative environments, her practice explores how design can be used as a method for exposing the entangled complexity of technology, culture and environment, and open up space for new pathways towards more socially just and sustainable futures.   Dr. Russell is co-director of the Imaginative Methods Lab, a research and teaching platform dedicated to developing practices and tools to re-imagine the rights to research and design.

Abstract: This talk will present our work in the Imaginative Methods Lab (SFU) through a close reading of a recent project we did for the Museum of Art, Architecture and Technology (MAAT), Lisbon Portugal. Titled, Disturbing Conservation: Remapping the Avencas MPA, the work combined tactics of critical design with elements of new materialist methodologies and practice-based research to develop methods to imagine with people as a means to collectively (re)think the present, apprehend the unknown, and intervene in the world.