A wide shot of a ceramics studio, featuring students working with pottery wheels and other tools.
Bun kneels on one knee between two floor lights.

Bun Stout

Lecturer

Bio

Bun Stout is a Chicago-based interdisciplinary artist engaging social technologies and Chicago’s drag club scene. Their art is centered in handmade augmented reality wearables, intentionally misusing software designed for social media. Combining fashion, photography, AR and poetry, they transform themself and other artists into otherworldly storytellers who appear IRL and hidden within technological spaces.

Their work explores dynamics of beauty and power, contextualized in trans concepts of realness, the practical and economic value of performed beauty, and the ever-present possibility of transformation.

They have spoken about their work at the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender and Reproduction and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Exhibitions include interactive installations at Soho House Chicago, CURRENTS Festival, Ars Electronica, and Co-Prosperity. They hold a BFA from Indiana University and an MFA in Sculpture from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

Courses

Title Department Catalog Term

Description

The course Research Studio II builds on the learning outcomes from Research Studio I, asking students to continue to develop and connect their own work and ideas with a diverse range of artists, designers, and communities.

This spring the entire Contemporary Practice department will have a shared umbrella topic for our RSII courses: Contemporary Now. All RSII classes will engage with the present and what is happening right now. With the world moving so fast - a pandemic, fires burning across the US west, people marching in the streets across the globe, and the storms that seem to keep coming, it is critical we ask questions of ourselves as artists, designers, educators and cultural producers: What responsibility do we have at any moment in history? How can the diversity of our practices: research, study, making and actions, address the present and design the future we want to see?

In RSII courses students will investigate this shared departmental thematic through the intersection of their own practice and the pedagogical practices of their faculty. All RSII classes are interdisciplinary, faculty have provided a subtitle, and a short description to describe the lens through which their class will explore the theme of Contemporary Now.

Class Number

1373

Credits

3

Description

Students learn a wide range of post-production digital techniques for 2D animation, compositing (layering, collaging), and creating visual effects for video productions. Students produce projects that incorporate manipulated still images, animation, desktop video, and audio. Those who are intrigued by this kind of image manipulation will find the capabilities of the software dynamic and inspiring. Screenings and analysis focus on the use of such techniques in the world of video art, television, and film.

Class Number

1582

Credits

3

Description

Students learn a wide range of post-production digital techniques for 2D animation, compositing (layering, collaging), and creating visual effects for video productions. Students produce projects that incorporate manipulated still images, animation, desktop video, and audio. Those who are intrigued by this kind of image manipulation will find the capabilities of the software dynamic and inspiring. Screenings and analysis focus on the use of such techniques in the world of video art, television, and film.

Class Number

1449

Credits

3