JOERILEY.WORK




joriley@ucsd.edu
@pleasedontfront
linktr.ee/joeriley
mailing list
Photo: Natalie Conn

  Joe Riley is an artist, historian, and Ph.D. candidate at UC San Diego Visual Arts in a joint environmental research program with Scripps Institution of Oceanography’s Center for Marine Biodiversity and Conservation. 

  Joe’s research has recently been supported by the Getty Scholars Program, a UCSD Rita L. Atkinson Fellowship, and the UC Humanities Research Institute. His dissertation, Fixing the Sea: Case Studies Toward A Critical Environmental History of Ocean Art and Science since 1970, foregrounds and critically examines histories and practices of interaction between artists, oceanographers, and marine life situated within California’s university-military-research complex.

  From 2020–2025 Joe has been a participating artist and co-curator for the Pacific Standard Time exhibition Embodied Pacific, featuring projects by thirty artists working with researchers in laboratories, field sites, and archives in Southern California and the Pacific Islands. 

  Previously, he was an Ocean Fellow with TBA21-Academy and participated in the Whitney Independent Study Program. Joe holds a BFA from The Cooper Union School of Art and has taught at UC San Diego, Cal State San Marcos, Stevens Institute of Technology, and The Cooper Union.


AMD 316: Intro to Art, Science, & TechnologySpring 2023 - Spring 2024
Cal State San Marcos

“Intro to Art, Science, & Technology” is an interdisciplinary studio and lecture-based course centered on the juncture of science, visual technologies, and contemporary art practice. We explore key issues and histories of visual representation that put pressure on the disciplinary divisions of art and science while engaging with critical discussions about the power of images, creative interventions, and critical and interdisciplinary practices in context. To do so, we will investigate different approaches, materials, and technologies used by artists today, focusing especially on research trajectories in contemporary art and design that interact with histories and visual tools of science, such as specimen collections, printmaking, photography, and data visualization. 

The course is organized in three overlapping sequences/objects of study around which art, science, and technology tend to collide: collections, images, and communication. In the first sequence, we explore practices and fraught histories of scientific collecting and claims to objectivity/subjectivity as they face onto critical sites of interdisciplinary art practice. In the second, we engage with optical technologies and consider the use of photography in science and art, as well as the science and technology of printing (relief and silkscreen), image (re)production, preservation, and systems of classification. We conclude the term by working through the interrelated promises and challenges of scientific and artistic visual communication, looking at how communicative strategies (such as flow charts, idea maps, graphics, and performances) can convey complex ideas and reach beyond subject-specific information. 

Coursework consists of three sequence-specific assignments with both visual/material and written elements. Students are also expected to keep a dedicated “field notes” journal throughout the semester, to be periodically evaluated as a portion of their participation grade. In addition to preparing students for advanced courses in printmaking, photography, time-based media, and interdisciplinary art practices, this course also supports learning in knowledge areas like anthropology, philosophy, design, and the history of science and technology

This course includes lectures, demonstrations, hands on experimentation, field trips, site visits, and dialogues with practicing artists. Generally, we will begin each class with a lecture on the day’s topics and/or hold class discussion and critiques. The second half of the class will be hands on studio time where students will engage in projects designed around the course material. There will be field trips that will require us to meet off campus on occasion. Students will be informed when they are required to meet off campus.



Learning objectives and outcomes:

  • Demonstrate knowledge of the historical intersections, divergences, and exchanges of art, science, and print/photographic technologies.
  • Evaluate and utilize practices/methods of collaboration between artists and scientists through multimodal projects (group and individual)
  • Gain ability to present and critique interdisciplinary artwork and processes, and interact with others’ work through critical dialogue.
  • Acquire familiarity with, and practical knowledge of, a range of technologies, media, and materials germane to both visual communication in the sciences and artistic practice



Student work samples:

Lauren Vega
Anitza Juarez Reyonoso
Alan Lopez 
Crystal Rivera Camarillo
Jordan Lanter
Peter Whitley
Megan Honeck
Tyler Cook
Peter Whitley
Jack McCabe
Peter Whitley
Jacob Wilhelm
Crystal Rivera Camarillo
Reggy Ishaq
Carlos Esquivel
Cia Soto
Peter Whitley
Edson Arcos