Argentina: Hi/Low Tech

About this Travel Course

Latin America has a long-standing and unrivaled history of hybridity that began over 500 years ago and persists until today. Contemporary Argentina is not an exception, and exists within globalizing processes of cross-cultural contacts that create world markets for money and material goods, migrants, and information. This course will provide a comprehensive exposure for recognizing the nature and value of "a world of sciences and arts" multiple scientific, technological, and artistic traditions adapted to local materials, regional needs, resources, and interests.

Centralized in Buenos Aires city, with our headquarter studio at the local makerspace, Espacio Nixso, this course is a hands-on workshop which will introduce the fundamentals of DIY electronic circuits, embedded programming, sensor signal processing, simple mechanisms, and time-based behavior; along with an in-depth investigation into the forms uses, interpretations, and meanings of objects, products, images, and environments in everyday Argentina.

Besides our partnership with the local community at Espacio Nixso, during this course we will be working closely with two very different Material Libraries. The first one dedicated to the collection of industrial solid wastes located in Avellaneda, one of the foremost wholesale and, industrial centers of Argentina, situated within, the grater Buenos Aires metropolitan area. The, other material library is located in Oberá, Province of Misiones, in the northeastern corner, of the country, about 700 miles from Buenos, Aires. This library collects regional materials, (organic and locally manufactured) such as wood, minerals, metals, textiles, and clay.

Students will attend field trips to museums, local informal markets, milongas, popular and folklore music shows, visits to different worker, cooperatives, among others daily field trips. The studio will also have a strong component into reading discussions and lectures, as well as weekly studio visits and talks from renown local artists, designer, and scholars.

Students will keep an active travel journal and sketchbook in response to site visits, assigned readings, and short assignments. These materials combined with an immersion in the Argentinian lifestyle will inform the final project - an interactive object examining the relationship between hi and low technologies, knowledges, and materials. The final projects will be exhibit at final review with guest critics and open to the general public.

Student + Faculty Stories

Read more about Argentina: Hi/Low Tech in RISD News: Gallery Goes Global