Notes
Artistic collaboration centers on genuinely being with others engaged in process-oriented work. Thriving on dialogue, risk-taking, openness, and agency, collaboration transforms existing knowledge, thought styles, and artistic approaches into new (sometimes radical) visions. This course will explore transformative collaborative processes that challenge us, as artists, to explain ourselves better, listen more closely to others, and approach artistic challenges in a spirit of goodwill that builds empathy, insight, trust, and authentic (co)expression. In this course, we will evaluate historical collaborations and engage with and group-reflect on collaborative processes. We will do this in several ways: (1) by becoming familiar with the critical inquiry on artistic collaboration and collaboration design by Mark Elliot, Vera John-Steiner, and others, (2) by exploring past creative collaborations, ranging from the visual arts to dance to theater to music, (3) by experimenting with collaborative processes, such as Critical Response Process, Frantic Assembly, and Viewpoints, (4) by observing firsthand artistic collaborations, such as improv comedy, jazz improvisation, and devised theater, and (5) by co-creating a term-long collaboration as part of our final project. Ultimately, these cumulative efforts will help us formulate a new theory for practicing artistic collaboration that builds on and significantly deviates from ideas already put forth by those mainly in the business world.
