Dr Benjamin Hall

Benjamin Hall is an animator and educator with an interest in collaborative practice. Dum Dum (De De Bom) is a collaboration between Hall and his son Robin (six years old at the time), who drew the pictures and Hall 'animated' them. The film aligns with Hall's research practice which explores collaboration, community and play as methods for the generation of new material. This approach incorporates a development of Simon Nicholson’s Theory of Loose Parts, a methodology that focuses on fostering creative communities and collaborations with children as both ‘experts in play’ and ‘design determinants’ . The aim of the work was to encourage the creative potential in everyone, especially children and inspire others to collaborate and contribute too. Dum Dum (De De Bom) featured as part of Shorts for Wee Ones, a travelling showcase commissioned by the Discovery Film Festival in Dundee, where it made its UK debut in October 2018. In addition the film has featured at animation festivals worldwide, including MiCe, Spain [2019], Anima, Belgium [2019], VOID, Denmark [2019], Leeds Young Film Festival, UK [2019], Animocje, Poland [2019], British Animation Film Festival, UK [2019, Festival RDVBD, Belgium [2019] and most recently at Annecy International Animation Film Festival [2019] as part of the festival's Official Selection in the Perspectives Short Film Competition. Dum Dum (De De Bom) has since been licensed by Random Acts, Channel 4's short film strand which showcases ‘bold expressions of creativity’ . The film will be screened across Channel 4's online and broadcast platforms. As a result of this exposure, Dum Dum (De De Bom) has been included in the British Council UK Animation Catalogue 2019, a publication created to 'represent the wide range of UK films made each year' .

Marc Prensky (1946 - present) coined the term ​digital natives​ to represent those that have ‘spent their entire lives surrounded by and using computers, video-games, digital music players, video cams, cell phones, and all the other toys and tools of the digital age' (Prensky, 2001, p. 1). As an opposite Prensky defines ​digital immigrants​ - or ​analogue natives​ as I prefer - those that witnessed the arrival of such technological advances. The natives are at odds, separated by the ​digital divide​, a border evolved through difference: the wired and the wireless; the type and the swipe; the visible and invisible. It’s a difference that can often get in the way causing division, but can be an opportunity for convention. Slow Code​ details a practical and conceptual approach to creative practice based around intentionally slowing down how we contribute to and consume digital culture. The slowness and limitations that once frustrated the ​analogue native​ growing up ​can​ be used for good. We discuss ​colour clash​ in relation to print processes and manually code SVGs, replacing comfort and control of the UI with a playful uncertainty. What was previously a hindrance becomes a useful tool for learning and discovery in a post-digital age.

Picturing Security Picturing Security is an ongoing research project funded by the Independent Social Research Foundation (ISRF) led by Rachel Julian, Jill Gibbon, and Benjamin Hall. The project aims to explore experiences of security, risk and threat using collaborative arts practice as a tool for conversation. During 2023 and 2024, Gibbon and Hall established a studio community consisting of students and staff from Leeds Beckett University to discuss through animation and drawing what ‘security’ meant to the group. The workshops that took place involved direct dialogue, but a more indirect conversation emerged at a material level in the marks that were exchanged during the sessions. The intention with the workshops was to establish a democratic community that arrived at a consensual trajectory for the activity moving forward. However that which is labelled democratic still suffers bias, and unrepresentative binaries are often formed according to the loudest, most confident voices. This phenomenon is true of a wider global context where opinion is ignored, censored and silenced by oppressive, violent means. Within the workshops we identified that the material gathered during each session had a voice, which could direct us in what to do next and in particular how it could be brought to life, offering an authentic form of democratic representation for all. In her book Vibrant Matter: A Political Ecology of Things, Jane Bennett discusses ‘vital materialism’ or ‘thing power’, a concept whereby all material, whether living or not, has a possibility for agency, indicating its own potential for life (Bennett, 2010, p. 20). In keeping with Bennett’s position, this presentation puts forward a methodology for using animation workshops as a means to foster collaborative, creative communities where all voices can be heard. In addition to a spoken presentation, we will draw upon artefacts from the project which include drawings, music and animation. Barad, K. (2007) Meeting the Universe Halfway: Quantum Physics and the Entanglement of Matter and Meaning. Duke University Press. Bennett, J. (2010) Vibrant Matter: A Political Ecology of Things. Duke University Press Books. Freire, P. (1996) Pedagogy of the Oppressed. Translated by M. B. Ramos. Penguin Books.

Your World of Text (YWoT) is a web-based platform that allows users to freely commit writing to an infinite, text-based open world. Mirroring the concrete poetics of 1980s interactive fiction, YWoT is a online play-ground that attracts textual contributions in the form of self-expression, ASCII art and (as is to be expected with a unmoderated, frictionless space) the usual vulgarity. For the past few years, BA Illustration at Leeds Beckett University has been using YWoT to facilitate The Camp, a collaborative, creative writing workshop as part of its first-year narrative module. In the session, participants are ‘abandoned’ on a mono-spaced hillside and given prompts to follow - such as collecting wood to light a fire, unpacking bags and building a den - all committed as text to the platform. In From Line to Constellation, poet Eugen Gomringer puts forward the concept of the constellation as the ‘simplest possible kind of configuration in poetry’ (Gomringer, 1954). He states: “The constellation is ordered by the poet. He determines the play-area, the field or force and suggests its possibilities. The reader, the new reader, grasps the idea of play, and joins in.” (Ibid., 1954) In terms of The Camp, YWoT is a ‘play-area of fixed dimensions’ (Ibid., 1954), permitting such arrangements to be formed. There was an intention here to encourage poiesis by stealth: as students respond and interact, they are taking part in a participatory, concrete text. As expected, they create fragments, stories, poems and compositions and fragments, all with the possibility for future development. But more happens. Whilst meaning is being made at a narrative level, the same happens at a community level, making and strengthening the connections between them through play. This presentation will draw upon The Camp in order to demonstrate how collaborative writing and play can be an important tool for both creative possibility and community building. Gomringer, E. (1954) From Line to Constellation [ONLINE] Available from: https://www.tetragrammaton.com/content/linetoconstellation

For the past few years, BA Illustration at Leeds Beckett University has been using Your World of Text (yourworldoftext.com) to facilitate The Camp, a collaborative, creative writing workshop as part of its first-year narrative module. In the session, participants are ‘abandoned’ on a mono-spaced hillside and given prompts to follow - such as collecting wood to light a fire, unpacking bags and building a den - all committed as text to the platform. There was an intention here to encourage poiesis by stealth: as students respond and interact, they are unwittingly taking part in a participatory, concrete text. As expected, they create fragments, stories, poems and ASCII compositions, all with the possibility for future development. But more happens. Whilst meaning is being made at a narrative level, the same happens at a community level - koinopoiesis - making and strengthening the connections between them through play.

On a recent car journey, a friend instructed his car’s voice recognition system to direct us to our destination. After he had spoken, there was a pause and then a hesitant, female voice replied ‘errr… erm…’ I was stunned. In that confused moment I was convinced that artificial intelligence had finally arrived at a truly sentient benchmark. What had actually happened was that a delayed response from sat nav’s AI had permitted a fortuitous continuation of a radio interview where the interviewee considered her response to a question, before a more automated, male voice took over. This accidental audio collage made me question just what is it that is lacking with contemporary AI? Was it the doubt? The apprehension of a possible error? The humility? Earlier outings with ChatGPT had resulted in frustration: it turns out he’s a compulsive liar. These journeys were all about being directed to multiple HTTP 404s on Amazon for books he had made up, people that didn’t exist. I now discover such hallucinations are common. Instead of admitting to these mistakes, ChatGPT doubles down: apparently I had made a mistake, not him. This wasn’t a critical friend. Etymologically to err is also a journey, but one that is off-course, having unintentionally (or not) taken a wrong turn. Within creative education it is an open embrace of such mistakes that leads to learning, but how can we work with technology that won’t admit to or acknowledge their own, let alone reflect honestly upon them? In this presentation I will explore the origin and purpose of the error as an errantic tool for arts education, and how we might encourage artificial intelligence to spend longer in this erratic space, to become a critical collaborator within creative practice.

Hall, B., Hassall, J & Stirling, L. (2017). Permission to Play [paper] delivered at Playful Learning Conference 2017, 13th July 2017, Manchester Metropolitan University.

Hall, B & Hassall, J (2017) Wordhouse [workshop] delivered at Playful Learning Conference 2017, 13th July 2017, Manchester Metropolitan University.

Briggs, J & Hall, B (2017) Tumblrweed [installation], 22 Apr to 29 Apr 2017, Millennium Square as part of Leeds Digital Festival 2017

Briggs, J & Hall, B (2016) Instagramophone [digital installation] exhibited at Leeds University’s iscMME 2016, 14th June 2016, University of Leeds

Briggs, J & Hall, B (2016) Code of Play [paper] delivered at Work and Play: An Interdisciplinary Conference 2016, 6th July 2016, Futureworks.

Hall, B., Hassall, J., Robinson, L. & Stirling, L. (2015) Power of Play [paper] delivered at Symplaysium, 26th Sep 2015, The Tetley.

Exploding the University is a Summer School for people interested in design’s critical, social and political potential. Founded on the principles of friendship, it is an experimental space for collaborative learning and exchange. Inspired by the history of radical learning and informal education. From Greenham Common to Bauhaus, Black Mountain College to the Black Panther Movement, Bristol Construction School to the Workers’ Education Movement. Its long-term aim is to create a community of designers who come together occasionally. The name is an ode to Colin Ward’s writings on learning; his ideas on the environment as an educational resource, the enquiring school and the school (or university) without walls. Exploding the University is a project by Conway and Young in collaboration with Mellisa Thompson, Dr Kiff Bamford, Jo Hassall, Ben Hall and Dr Liz Stirling. 2016’s Summer School was supported by the University of the West of England, and Leeds Beckett University.

I am a lecturer on BA (Hons) Graphic Arts and Design, a course unique in its use of experiential teaching methods, diversity of creative practices and a non-hierarchical, collaborative learning environment. In the second year we run GAD5.2 Process Brief, a module which encourages a process-led approach to creative practice. On the surface, this is the ubiquitous Graphic Processes unit, but in practice this far from the convention. On the first day we go Magnet Fishing at the Leeds Liverpool canal using high-strength retrieval magnets to pull rusted objects from the water. We don't tell the students how to fish, we instigate an opportunity for self-instruction. In Cave Drawing we listen to lectures on the subject of the vagus nerve so that our mind is distracted whilst our body chooses to paint. We don't tell the students how to paint, we just join in the activity ourselves. We run The Workshop That Must Not be Named, a session where the only permitted planning is a room booking. Again, we don't tell the students what to do: their guess is as good as ours. The key here is stepping back, but not away; we are stepping back and joining the community. GAD5.2 Process Brief is about activity: doing and making; it isn't concerned with outcomes. In this way the material and the method become a conduit allowing us to move between disciplines as such distinctions no longer seem to fit. At a point within the module there is a moment where students forget that they are learning, and we forget we are teaching. We are fostering an inclusive, creative community, one which is reciprocal and social. This presentation will focus on GAD5.2 Process Brief outlining case studies from the module as a methodology for others to use within their practice.

This paper outlines an example of Special Collections materials being used to support master's-level students' data and digital skills development. It evidences positive student learning outcomes through an unconventional interdepartmental collaboration between a digital media teaching team and Special Collections staff, which combined digital practices and tangible Special Collections material. This paper outlines the readings used for the course under review, the assignments used to evaluate students, student experiences of those assignments, and staff observations of student success and the logistics of course delivery. Findings show that in completing their assignments students (a) negotiated uncertainty; (b) increased understandings of data and digital methods; (c) embraced the lifeworlds of data; and (d) blurred the boundaries of analog and digital. More generally, this work finds that Special Collections material can be effectively used to support data and digital skills development, as well as help students gain broader understandings of digital contexts and media. Value is, however, dependent upon embracing uncertainty: something that universities tend to avoid. But, as is shown, staff and students alike can thrive in states of bewilderment.

The presentation featured as part of UAL’s Creative Education Online (CEO) Seminar Series, a number of discussions that explore the future of creative art and design education in digital spaces. This talk focussed on Simon Nicholson discussing his lesser known, but no less influential, TAD292 Art and Environment, a course unit for the Open University that built upon a development of his Theory of Loose Parts. The CEO Seminar series was attended by academics and researchers with an interest in art-school and online pedagogies.

The term curation has its etymological roots in Latin, coming from curare meaning literally ‘to care for’. In a contemporary context curation implies a process of selecting and presenting artefacts or items within an exhibition or a museum. In 2018, in collaboration with my son Robin (aged six years at the time), I made Dum Dum (De De Bom), a short film where he drew the pictures and I ‘animated’ them. We didn’t set out to make an animation; the intention was to spend time together after the school pick-up by going on walks, talking and sitting drawing in cafés (the latter became the footage for the film). Curation, in both senses, led to Dum Dum (De De Bom), a serendipitous byproduct of child-care and evidence that animation could be unsought, harnessed through the careful selection of narrative opportunities. In his book Les Lances du Crépuscule, Philippe Descola, details a conversation with his research advisor, anthropologist Lévi-Strauss ahead of an ethnographic study of the Upper Amazon. Lévi-Strauss suggests that Descola forego his meticulous plans and expectations, and instead let himself go ‘along with the lie of the land’ (Descola, 1996, p. 40). Doing so would enable Descola to openly embrace the multitude of possibilities that lay ahead, leading to new knowledge and discovery. We often find ourselves in a similar position with animation, a craft centred around revision and planning. Such conventions leave little room for spontaneity. Drawing on works-in-progress, this paper looks at how we too can abandon our plans, embrace uncertainty and employ curation as a method for arriving at new and unexpected narratives in animation.

Briggs, J., Hall, B., Hassall, J & Stirling, L. (2017) Permission to Play [paper] delivered at Practice as Research - A Symposium, 5th May 2017, Leeds Beckett University

Briggs, J & Hall, B (2016) Project Something [exhibition], 29 Apr to 4 May 2016, Leeds Beckett University as part of Leeds Digital Festival 2016

Hall, B (2016) Another Engine [digital installation] exhibited at Project Something, 29th Apr to 4th May 2016, Leeds Beckett University (L).

Briggs, J & Hall, B (2016) Instagramophone [digital installation] exhibited at Here or There, 29th October, Hallam Hall part of Sheffield Design Week 2016.

Crash Landing: Design, Website Content & Software. An Engineering Education Resource Published November 2016 Launched in Parliament with the backing of 3 current MPs

The Gyre is an interactive installation that sets out to raise awareness for our collective, digital consumption and the global, carbon impact that this can have. The project forms part of a long-standing collaboration between Briggs and Hall who have together developed methods for creating immersive digital collage which employ waste fragments from online platforms using code. The Gyre takes the form of a projected installation and a web app that allows users to contribute their own online activity in the form of a personalised visualisation. In addition to the climate change focus, the project explored the use of emerging XR technologies for the purposes of digital storytelling. The SME partner for this project was Field who were able to fulfil the funding call and meet the criteria for the project delivery. The Gyre secured £25,000 funding from XR Stories Climate Challenge and was exhibited as part of Green Screens: Environmental Sustainability and XR Storytelling event at York's Guildhall in January 2023. The project was also selected for inclusion at South by South West (SXSW) in Austin, USA by the Immersive Futures Lab, who represented the UK’s emerging talent in digital storytelling. Sue Edmunds of XR Stories wrote: “The Immersive Futures Lab welcomed more than 500 people and the XR Stories demos were a major attraction, sparking intrigue and conversations with visitors from many different institutions and industries.” (Edmunds, 2023, para.4) The Gyre has featured prominently in marketing from XR Stories and their associated partners across social media and communications. Edmunds, S. (2023) Propelling UK XR at SXSW, XR Stories [ONLINE] Available at: https://xrstories.co.uk/propelling-uk-xr-at-sxsw/ (Accessed: 05 February 2023).

This workshop / paper presents Herman, the unofficial and unexpected mascot of independent learning who dares students and staff to embrace performative and unconventional approaches to creative practice.

From 26 February to 7 March 2024, students and staff from BA Illustration at Leeds Beckett University relocated their studio to a stall in Leeds Kirkgate Markets as part of an impulsive project, Drawing Out, the name literally mapping the activity. As the project unfolded, an additional multidimensional metaphor emerged which hinted that drawing could be used as a tool to establish unseen social alignments and invite serendipitous encounters with groups and individuals. Students and staff came away from the project with a sense that something truly magical had happened. In this presentation we set out how drawing can facilitate new opportunities for learning and how we create conditions to foster and recognise these possibilities as and when they arrive.

St Paul’s Animation Club was a ten week after-school club which took place at St Paul’s CofE school in York in the summer term of 2023. These sessions were mixed ages and encouraged playful, experimental approaches where the children could adopt and develop their own individual ideas and methods around animation. The Animated Tea Towel was the filmic result, a nod to the practice of the inclusive and representational fundraising artefact favoured by primary schools worldwide: the class tea towel. The film was curated from a wealth of static and animated material created in the workshops where children explored boiling line, loops & cycles, keyframes & inbetweening, lip-syncing, rotoscoping and more. As an activity that took place out of school hours, the sessions adopted a democratic learning environment, where the facilitators (both animators and parents themselves) asked the question: what do you really want to do? Each week was responsive to the needs and wishes of the group in order to establish a consensual trajectory for learning. In keeping with this education philosophy, we were keen that any outcome from St Paul’s Animation Club was directed by the children themselves and not imposed by adults as is so often the case in young people’s lived experience. This agency was achieved directly through articulation and expression, and also indirectly through the material that was created in the sessions. This method allowed for all the children to have a say whether they were confident enough to speak up - or not - including those voices that might ordinarily be overlooked. This presentation looks at how animation can be an important tool for representation, expression and the authentic voice of children.

In the post-pandemic university, hybridity has become a widely touted norm. The term implies agility around methods of learning, though is often limited to either in-person or on-line delivery. Despite the claim, hybridity is never truly so, and is compromised further by a framework of centrally enforced metrics which divide teaching into inflexible categories based around time or subject scope. A more radical form of hybridity proposed by Colin Ward and Anthony Fyson was a pedagogic dynamite which would ‘explode’ the school into the urban environment (Ward & Fyson, 1973). Their solution was environmental education, or ‘streetwork’, a learning approach that identified ‘rich reservoirs of possibility in the everyday’ (Burke, 2014). As part of a two-week project Drawing Out, we decamped BA (Hons) Illustration students from Leeds Beckett University to a stall in the middle of Leeds Kirkgate Markets. In keeping with Ward and Fyson’s approach, the residency actively invited these hybrid overlaps and their associated opportunities for learning. Drawing Out encouraged experiential encounters that would not have been possible had we been on campus: cultural conversations, a pirate radio station interview, and a visit by indigenous artists from the Amazon. Each experience offered the students (and staff) new perspectives on their learning. Drawing critically upon the project, this paper advocates for further ‘explosions’ across academia in order to foster more meaningful opportunities for learning inside and outside of the institution. This will take the form of an animated film using drawings undertaken during the residency accompanied by a scripted reflection. Burke, C. (2014) “Fleeting pockets of anarchy”: Streetwork. The exploding school, Paedagogica Historica, 50:4, 433-442, DOI: 10.1080/00309230.2014.899376 Ward, C. & Fyson, A. (1973) Streetwork: The Exploding School. London: Routledge.