Artistic Research (AR) can be employed as an “umbrella concept” that captures “a landscape of various approaches to knowledge production in performing arts” (Arlander in Barton 2018: 28).
Practice as Research (PaR)
Practice as Research (PaR) is a subspecies of Artistic Research resting on the triangulation of know how (practical exploration), know that (theoretical knowledge of the field), and know what (critical inquiry into practice and theory) (Nelson 2013).
PaR questions:
How can we meaningfully integrate robots and telepresence in the theatre?
How can we shape the interaction between online audiences and the A.I. robot simulations?
Arts-Based Research (ABR)
Arts-Based Research (ABR) is also a subspecies of Artistic Research:
“Arts-based research (ABR) involves adapting the tenets of the creative arts to social research projects. ABR values aesthetic understanding, evocation, and provocation. These approaches allow us to tap into the unique capabilities of the arts as a way of knowing Methodologically, these practice-based approaches rely on generative processes in which the artistic practice itself may be the inquiry.” (Leavy 2017: 191)
“ABR, or what some call performative social science, emerges out of a fusion between artistic practice and scientific or social scientific practice.” (Leavy 2017: 194)
“ABR occurs along an art-science continuum” (Leavy 2017: 196)
ABR questions:
How should human-robot relationships evolve?
What should social robots be like to be accepted?
What is the worst-case scenario for the development of social robots?
References
Books:
Leavy, Patricia (2017) Research Design: Quantitative, Qualitative, Mixed Methods, Arts-Based, and Community-Based Participatory Research Approaches, New York and London, The Guilford Press.
Nelson, Robin (ed.) (2013) Practice as Research in the Arts: Principles, Protocols, Pedagogies, Resistances, London, Palgrave Macmillan.
Book chapter:
Barton, Bruce (2018) ‘Wherefore PAR? Discussions on “a line of flight” ’ in Arlander, Annette et al (eds.), Performance as Research: Knowledge, Methods, Impact (ebook), London & New York, Routledge: 25-42.
