GOING ON TOUR: ART & TOURISM

Calendar

Day 1.
Introduction
Pop image of the US Tourist - National Lampoon's Vacation (more)
We're not going to do an ethnography of the tourist, as much as look for ways of both occupying the role of both tourist and guide in productive and critical ways.
Tourism as field of inquiry - both subject and methodology of art
Tourism and the Everyday
Short Exercise: Reading a Landscape
WHAT: Produce an account of a landscape that you inhabit or pass through regularly—somewhere you might consider "ordinary." Refering to Lewis' "Axioms" text, try to construct a reading of your landscape with the evidence available on-site. Think carefully about what differentiates a landscape from, say a typical interior space. Produce a collection of either photographs or objects that provide one way to understand your landscape. Your narrative can be a speculative/poetic reading, it can be based on observations of events and people in the space, or any other number of ways of relating to your landscape. These don't need to be a comprehensive account of the landscape, in fact, they shouldn't try to be. No additional research should be done—only use what you can observe/collect on site!
One way to begin to do this is to think about the landscape in total (Macro: what are its boundaries? what are its general qualities) and also how it is composed of different, discrete elements (Micro: what are the parts of the landscape? how do the parts relate to the whole? To each other? which parts are 'necessary' for that particular landscape? which parts do you read as 'optional' or even 'out of place'?)
HOW: bring to class a collection of 5-10 photos or objects. Each image or object should have a 'caption,' either a single word, phrase or sentence that puts it in context. You can bring in objects if you like, or you can take photos. For all photos, create a Flickr account (if you don't have one) and upload to this 'pool' (class flickr pool)
I'll provide a somewhat related example of creating a narrative typology of pictures in class, but also check out:
Mark Fischer's pictures of "tattooed family men at a children's theme park"
Denis Wood's maps of Boylan Heights (and this radio segment on This American Life)
Due the following week

Readings for next class:
Ben Highmore's "Figuring the Everyday" from Everyday Life and Cultural Theory
Pierce Lewis' "Axioms for Reading the Landscape" from The Interpretation of Ordinary Landscapes

Day 2.
Discuss Highmore/Lewis readings
What exactly do we mean by "everyday"?
Discuss landscape "readings"
Reading for next class: Don Mitchell's "New Axioms for Reading the Landscape"
New Exercise: Rereading the Landscape
What: Using Mitchell's response to Lewis' originally stated axioms, let's try to expand our reading of the landscape a bit, and in the form of a simple map. These maps won't be conventional delineations of space, but will rather provide an outline to the boundaries of the landscape (as you perceive them) and directions for learning more about it. You don't need to do anything in particular with the sources, you just need to identify them (what are they, where are they, what might we learn from them). Your sources can be literary, historical, biographical, statistical, but CANNOT be sources present in the landscape, or at least not easily accessible. Be as inventive or literal as you like!
HOW: Produce a paper map that centers around your originally identified landscape. From there, identify at least 10 sources of information/knowledge that could be used to inform a user about the landscape. Your maps can use drawings, text/type, photographs, copies, and any other means of making an image. They can be created by hand or using software, but your finished maps should be brought in on paper.
* Bring the following week

Day 3.
Look at/discuss paper maps + Mitchell reading
Screening: Bill Daniels' "Bozo Texino"
* Using check out window, lab
Reading for next class: Territories introduction (Delaney)

Day 4.
Discuss Territories reading
Campus Territorial Scavenger Hunt
Reading for next class: MacCannell "Sightseeing and Social Structure"
New Assignment (for groups of 2-3): Seeing/Sightseeing
View: 01s insignificant building, CLUI, NE Thing Co., Tseng Kwon Chi

Day 5.
Film Screening: Bill Brown's "Mountain State"
Discuss: "Sightseeing and Social Structure"
Discuss progress on project 1
Everyone will visit at least 2 itineraries and report back to the class.

Day 6.
Project 1 Due - in class review
Readings for next week:
MacCannell "Staged Authenticity"
Lucy Lippard's "The Tourist At Home" from _On the Beaten Track_
Jamaica Kincaid's "A Small Place"

Day 7.
Discuss MacCannel/Lippard/Kincaid readings
New Assignment: Front + Back Spaces (completed by groups of 2-3)
Film Screening: Cannibal Tours

Day 8.
Sound Exercise
Discuss progress on Front/Back Space videos

Day 9.
View: Front + Back Spaces assignments
Reading for next week: Urry "Pavements and Paths"

Day 10.
Discuss "Pavements and Paths"
New Assignment: Mobilities - walking (completed by groups of 2-3)
View Projects: Invisible 5, Janet Cardiff/George Miller

Day 11.
Film Screening: "Life & Debt"
Discuss progress on walks

Day 12.
Discuss Walks
New Assignment: Dialectical Diversions
Projects: Toxic Tours, Pocho Res Soc, And While London Burns
Reading for next class:
+ Gregory Ulmer "Metaphoric Rocks"

Day 13.
Discuss Ulmer reading
Reading for next class: Shields "Political Tourism"

Day 14.
Discuss "Political Tourism"
Reading for next class: Paul Carter "An Outline of Names"

Day 15.
Discuss "An Outline of Names"

Day 16.
Review final projects