The CUNY Art and Computer Technology Conference, organized by art faculty, academic computing staff and art slide collection managers who formed a subcommittee of the Office of Instructional Technology's Art and Technology Group, was held at City College on May 12th.

The day-long gathering, designed to explore the ways in which computer technology is being used in the teaching of art history and studio art at CUNY, brought together faculty from many of the colleges and, as a bonus, offered a chance to see City College's new Multimedia Center in action (see the article on page 15 of this issue). Its topics ranged from the application of digital technology to art slide collections, to creating interactive teaching tools, to presenting the results of scholarly research in multimedia formats. In each case, the application presented was one being developed by CUNY faculty making use of CUNY facilities.

The event kicked off with greetings by David Bushler, Acting Dean for the Division of the Arts at City College, Ron Bajakian, representative for Apple Computer, and Holland Cotter of CUNY/CIS, followed by opening remarks by Sally Webster, professor and chair of the art department at Lehman College and member of the art history faculty at the Graduate Center.

Webster spoke for many of the CUNY humanities faculty when she described her own relatively recent introduction, as a non-"techie," to the burgeoning range of interactive computing.

"I had the opportunity several years ago to teach an interdisciplinary course in the humanities," she said, "and it allowed me to investigate a few ideas I had about the teaching of modern art. I have come to believe that for students to fully understand the revolutionary impact of modernism, they need to be aware that dramatic transformations took place in all the arts and I wondered if it would be possible to teach a course that included the cubist painting and sculpture of Picasso, the diatonic music of Igor Stravinsky, the free verse of Gertrude Stein, the photograms of Man Ray, and the film strips found on early nickelodeons.

"The way I wanted to organize the course required slides, sound, and film equipment not available in most classrooms. Nor was I able to imagine how I could move effortlessly from one machine to another. Today, however, it is possible with multimedia software and technology to create such a course...I could map out a curriculum in early modernism with images, text, sound and motion that would enable students to roam from subject to subject, ideally, making connections that better and more fully inform their understanding of the arts of our time."

After Webster's address, the morning program focused on "Technology and the College Art Curriculum: CUNY Faculty Projects." In an introductory presentation entitled "Traditional vs. Multimedia Approaches to Teaching," Maurice Poirier, professor of art history at Kingsborough Community College, demonstrated, simply but clearly, the contrast between the time-honored slide presentation of art images and the use of Compact Disks in which textual information can be included. As Poirier pointed out, the use of CDs as a primary teaching tool is a major leap - allowing students to review lectures, refresh their memories and extend their comprehension of course material.

Poirier's technology review provided a natural segue to "A Teacher's Guide to Public Art in the Bronx," a multimedia project being developed both as a CD-ROM for interactive instructional tool to Bronx public schools and libraries, and as a document on the Internet. Developed by Susan Hoeltzel, director of the Lehman College Art Gallery, and George Tucci, lecturer in photography and computer graphics at Lehman, the "Teacher's Guide" is one of several pilot projects funded by the CUNY Office of Instructional Technology under the direction of Colette Wagner, director of Education and Training at CUNY/CIS.

The project originated with an exhibition and catalogue produced at the Lehman Gallery in 1994 which inventoried a century of public art in the borough. Hoeltzel noted that "the project will provide a new look at the extraordinary resources of the Bronx as an art collection in and of itself, though one with few visual arts institutions." The work ranges from 19th century cemetery sculpture to a recently-installed stained-glass window designed by Romare Bearden for a Bronx subway stop, to contemporary work funded by the Department of Cultural Affairs and installed in public schools, hospitals, government offices, as well as on the Lehman campus itself. When completed, the project will include a Bronx history component, maps, and curriculum materials for teachers.

A presentation by Elizabeth O'Connor, professor and chair of the City College art department and Annette Weintraub, Director of the Robinson Center for Graphic Arts and Communication Designs at City on the fine art module of City College's ambitious multimedia "World Arts" curriculum completed the morning panel.

"Images on the Network: Exploring Issues" provided the future focus of the afternoon session. Weintraub, joined by Bill Tinker, lecturer in the art department, returned for a presentation titled "Image-Capture: Processing and Management," which further explored the electronic manipulation of high-resolution visual materials.

Steven Kowalik, art slide librarian in the Hunter College Art Department, reported on the initial steps in the development of a digitized art slide library database at his site. Speaking as a "newbie" to the field of electronic technology, he shared his own trial-and-error experience with producing digitized course materials on CD-ROM and noted the practical benefits and disadvantages of this format as perceived by the Hunter art faculty.

David Gillison, professor of photography and graphic art at Lehman College, introduced his Web document-in-progress on Papua, New Guinea, another CUNY/CIS-sponsored faculty project. Gillison originated his research when photographing birds-of-paradise on the island, but he soon became closely involved with the international environmental preservation program for the Crater Mountain Wildlife Management Area, a 3000 square-foot rain forest surrounding a volcano in the New Guinea Central Highlands.

His electronic essay records not only threatened terrain but also the indigenous population,whose way of life is gradually being eroded. As Gillison noted, a project which began as a photographic archive has grown to an interdisciplinary document incorporating words, pictures and sound. In addition, interactive computer-based links will permit an ongoing exchange of information on the subjects among scientists, art historians and students throughout the world. (The Web address is: http://math240.lehman.cuny.edu/crater)

Lisa Livingston, Director of Instructional Media at City College, brought the afternoon session to a close with "Fair Use: Gateway to the Information Highway," a consideration of the complex and convoluted issues of copyright laws governing text and image reproduction in the ever-expanding electronic media. As she pointed out, copyright laws that until now have been "on the books" but seldom enforced may be brought to bear more stringently in the near future, with consequences to users involved in creating image-intensive art projects.

By the end of the conference, a number of things were clear: the range of possibilities for pedagogical application of new computer technology within the field of art are vast, that an ever-increasing number of CUNY faculty with non-technical backgrounds are creating innovative projects, and that such development is applicable to virtually every academic discipline.

Much of what was on view throughout the day is still very much "under construction" for reasons that Webster touched on in her opening remarks. She confessed to her own initial "resistance to stopping work in a traditional linear mode and to fully commit to cyberspace" and she emphasized the need for release time and project funding to support faculty as they venture into the creation of new electronic teaching tools.

But, she concluded: "By now no doubt you are aware that I am an enthusiastic supporter of the information age...I think we as faculty, students and administrators can create enormous opportunities for ourselves and for the University. Regardless of what we decide to do...the impact of this new technology on teaching and the study of the visual arts is going to be profound."