Making Content Relevant (Or Not): Exploring the Outcomes of a Project-Based Curriculum in Post-Secondary Art Appreciation

Because college students often struggle to understand the relevance of isolated and abstract art content to their programs of study and daily lives, this study explores the potential to generate meaningful education through a project-based curriculum in a college Art Appreciation course. Informed by research from educational psychology and neuroscience, this curriculum design was intended to help students (all non-art majors) connect course content to their social, emotional and physical realities and offer the potential to improve them. In class, students explored forms of visual communication, various media, and the relationship between art and culture before applying their findings to the design of a public artwork for their nearly art-free campus. Based on a constructivist epistemology and a phenomenological methodology, this study utilized participant observation, student projects and illustrated reflections as data sources. The results suggest positive outcomes, such as demonstrable understanding and application of course content as well as shortcomings, specifically the potential to fortify and actualize these connections

Ultra Low Carbon Vehicles: New Parameters for Automotive Design

As the influence of vehicle emissions on our environment has become better understood, the UK government has recently placed urgent emphasis on the implementation of low carbon technologies in the automotive industry through: the UK Low Carbon Industrial Strategy. The overall objective is to offer big incentives to consumers and support for the development of infrastructure and engineering solutions. This scheme however does not consider how the development of functional and experiential user value might drive consumer demand, contributing to the adoption of low carbon vehicles (LCVs) in the mass market. With the emergence of the North East of England as the UK’s first specialised region for the development of ultra-low carbon vehicles (ULCVs), ONE North East, as a development agency for the region's economic and business development, and Northumbria University Ideas-lab have supported a project to facilitate innovation through the collaboration of technology, research and development (R&D) and business. The High Value Low Carbon (HVLC) project aims to envisage new user value made possible by the integration of low carbon vehicle platforms with new process and network technologies. The HVLC consortium represents vehicle manufacturers and their suppliers as well as technology based companies and through an ongoing process of design concept generation the project offers a hub for innovation led enterprise. Whilst new technological developments in areas such as power generation, nano materials, hydrogen fuel cells, printed electronics and networked communications will all impact on future automotive design, the mass adoption of low carbon technologies represents a paradigm shift for the motorist. This paper aims to describe how the mapping of new parameters will lead to new transport scenarios that will create the space for new collaborative research on user experiences supported by innovative technologies and related services

Towards a heuristic model for experiential AI:analysing the Zizi Show in the new real

Based on the rapid pace of evolving creative practice in AI arts, we identify and respond to an urgent need to develop frameworks for analysing the critical dimensions (including social/political) of this emerging field. This paper offers a comprehensive case study of The Zizi Show, by Jake Elwes, developed as part of The New Real and Experiential AI programme at the Edinburgh Futures Institute within the University of Edinburgh. Based on this case study analysis, we propose the structuring of distinct project characteristics into four categories (socio-cultural and institutional aspects; technology and media; experience and affect; and audience and impact) which form the basis for a heuristic model. The statements/descriptors collected in each category serve to capture creative and design strategies that can lead design processes from cultural and technological perspectives, enable projects’ cross-examination and evaluation and surface blindspots in the creative process