This Week

Every week is a new adventure. See what is happening in class and get resources to prepare for the next meeting.

Whats happening?

International Collaboration

An optional element of the class is to travel to the Netherlands for a Dutch Design Week in Eindhoven, followed by a collaborative workshop in Rotterdam at the Willem de Kooning Academy with student from Sint Lucas in Antwerp joining the MICA and WdKA students.

Ready to go?

Final Exhibition

Students will present their research in a final exhibition. The opening night will feature presentations from all students.

Want the details?

Student Work

“Unravel the Code” is an interdisciplinary course at the Maryland Institute College of Art that draws upon traditional crafts to explore emerging technologies of making. We pair weaving with digital algorithms, origami with parametric laser cutting, and handwork with cybernetic systems of control. The first half of the semester features hands-on workshops led by visiting experts. These inform student’s research-based projects that become the focus of the second half of the semester. The course concludes with a public presentation of this exciting array of projects.

Every year students in Unravel the Code bring their own unique perspective to to new topics and technologies, and fearlessly pursue research through hands-on making. Each student or research team documents their work in a Creative Process Journal.

“MiEmMar” analogue synth suit by Miles Barnett, Emary Parisi, and Margeaux Abeyta UNRVL_17

Interdisciplinary Collaboration

The core of Unravel the Code is interdisciplinarity. This is modeled in the ways that we connect traditional crafts to emerging technologies of making in ways that yield new function, open poetic understanding, and spark innovation. We recognize that interdisciplinarity cannot happen without disciplines. We appreciate the depth of technical skill, rich histories, and modes thinking that are inherent to disciplines, and recognize that gaining mastery in a discipline is of great value. In UNRVL, student’s come from a rich variety of majors and backgrounds, and the content of the class is also spans a tremendous range. The key for each student is to figure out how the parts that are familiar help them to bridge into the areas that are new, allowing them to operate in new disciplines at an unexpectedly high level and to also expand their understanding of their primary discipline.

We also emphasize collaboration across disciplines. We have an amazing team of dedicated experts who generously share their knowledge in programming, systems engineering, electrical engineering, chemistry, and curating. These experts, at the heart of UNRVL, are adept not only in their field, but in the methods of translations across fields. They engage with the artists and designers enrolled in the class to bridge these disciplines by working together to find metaphors, invent language, and pioneer practices.