From Knowledge to Visual Creation: Some Information about the Department of Visual Knowledge at the Academy of Fine Arts in Wroclaw, Poland

Abstract

The Department of Visual Knowledge, a unique institution in Poland, was organized in 1971 as an interfaculty unit conducting research, didactic and artistic activities at the Higher State School of Fine Arts in Wroclaw. Its interdisciplinary character deals mainly with selected problems of psychophysiology, physics and aesthetics, with work conducted in the areas of creative practice, visual structures and experimental visual creation. The department consists of a Visualistics section with a psychophysical laboratory and a studio of technical media of visual transmission: photography, film, video and microcomputer. The primary objective of the department's research program is the exploration and rationalization of the rules in the sphere of visual transmission and experimentation with nonconventional methods. Fundamental research is being done in different areas of interest: for example, the relationship of physical measurements in defining elementary visual performance. The department also has the Studio of Visual Knowledge for students in their junior year and the Studio of Visual Creation for the senior year. From its beginning, the department has been the only one designed to deal with the specific features of the phenomenon of visualism, to integrate various branches of science and art, to study theory and nonconventional artistic practice and to elevate students' artistic awareness. In order to attain these goals, the department uses not only traditional means of representation (painting, graphics, sculpture) but also technical media such as photography, film, video and microcomputer, studying their visual characteristics and applying them, both individually and in combination, to creative activities. At present, the social role of visual media is steadily growing in importance. The concept of visual knowledge emphasizes the necessity of educating all of society about the nature of visual perception, taking into account properties of human eyesight. Visual knowledge is mainly concerned with visual structures and their interaction. By means of physical and artistic analyses of a visual structure, it is possible to examine and determine overall relations and functions among its elements and their interdependence in visual performance. Students and faculty are studying cognitive theory and problems of visual creativity in order to define phenomena and visual notations. An at-