Medienkunst/Mediengestaltung (Media Art and Design) B.F.A.

Im Radiostudio (©Bauhaus-Universität Weimar, Foto: Candy Welz)

»The responsibility of the artist is not to give answers. It is to ask questions.«

Robert Wilson, visiting professor at the Bauhaus-Universität Weimar (2011-2012)

New Public Spheres and Interpersonal Relationships: the Bachelor’s Degree Course in Media Art and Design

It’s all about information, media information. How can you disseminate and edit it? How can you imagine new futures and new fictions, and how can you turn them into reality? How can you create and reflect on media events? Or develop new public spheres and communicative spaces? Or design new interfaces for interpersonal relationships?  This course gives you the opportunity to contribute towards designing the objects of the future, or even to revolutionise media art, and, while you are at it, television and radio, too. Science, technology and art are not mutually exclusive. They belong together. That is the Weimar tradition.

In concrete terms: if you take the Bachelor’s Degree Course in Medienkunst/Mediengestaltung (Media Art and Design), you can expect small groups and individual projects, practical courses and unconventional approaches – artistic, technological and organisational. Close to our everyday media existence.

The auditory and the visual, the eventful, the conceptual and the interactive: these areas all overlap, and the permutations are legion. That is our unique profile. That is Media Art and Design at the Bauhaus-Universität Weimar.

From Elementary to Advanced: Course Structure

the Animation studio (©Bauhaus-Universität Weimar, photo: Candy Welz)

The initial two-semester basic study stage focuses on simple technical and practical questions: how do I operate a camera?; what exactly is a radio play?; what is there in my artistic ›tool kit‹?; what should the mobile phone of the future be able to do?; should it have even more functions?; should it even smell nice? Ask yourself these questions. Try them out. Play about with your ideas.

The subsequent four-semester specialist study phase has a more thematic focus. You will have opportunity to specialise in a particular artistic field, thus expanding your knowledge and becoming familiar with experimental forms of expression. You will be able to analyse and transform academic findings through the prism of your art. Optional courses from the chairs of Media Studies and Computer Science & Media will also give you a broader perspective. The same goes for external work placements and study periods spent at universities abroad. These are supported and recognized by the programme.

The standard study period for the Bachelor’s degree course in Media Art and Design is six semesters. Upon completion and defence of the Bachelor’s thesis, students are awarded the academic degree of »Bachelor of Fine Arts« by the Faculty of Art and Design.

Directors, Sound Designers and Media Artists: Professional Opportunities

Whether you want to create your own designs or commission them, work freelance or for a design company, the degree course in Media Art and Design opens up all sorts of professional opportunities for you. You will be able to work in areas that demand a creative and critical approach to the opportunities offered by the media: in editorial offices, cutting rooms and artistic laboratories; at a desk, in a studio or in the open air.
 
Here are some, but by no means all of the professional openings which the degree course will offer you:

  • film production, direction, camera work, lighting, editing, and dubbing for feature films, animation and documentaries
  • freelance design
  • curatorship of art and media festivals
  • creative art on the free art market
  • radio journalism, editing, radio drama and features, scriptwriting, direction, sound production and effects
  • editorial work and management in the entertainment and information industries (TV, computer games, internet, radio, leisure, interface design)
  • academic work
  • sound design and computer-assisted composition
  • TV direction, editorial work and journalism
  • web design/interface design, graphic design