New York State Summer School for the Arts
July 6, 2007: Virtual Reality, Cyberspace, and What's Coming Next
What does "utopia" mean? What belongs in a utopia for you?
What does "dystopia" mean? What belongs in a dystopia for you?
What are the advantages and dangers of Virtual Reality? List several of each.
What is a cyborg? Are you a cyborg?
What does it mean to be human?
The Futurists
The Futurists were an early 20th century avant garde art movement, led by an artist named Marinetti.
In Marinetti's 1909 Manifesto of Futurism, he summed up the major principles of the Futurists,
including a passionate loathing of ideas from the past, especially political and artistic traditions.
He and others also espoused a love of speed, technology and violence. The car, the plane,
the industrial town were all legendary for the Futurists, because they represented the technological
triumph of man over nature. The Italian Futurists imagined revolutionary new ways of eating,
Futurist Meals, that would create multi-sensory experiences for diners .
Giacomo Balla (Italy), Dynamism of a Dog on a Leash, 1912
Blade Runner
Ridley Scott (USA), Blade Runner still, 1982
Bladerunner imagines a future where the borders between human and beings
are blurred, where urban environments are a pastiche of forms from different times and places
in history.