High Tide Magazine

Features

Live from the Big Apple

Thursday, 28 December 2006

Toni Sant and Christine Trala spent a decade living in New York before coming to Scarborough to lecture at the university. We asked for their impressions so far.

Ever shot a video clip with your mobile phone? Used a digital camera to snap a sunset? If so, you are a digital artist. Not only that, says Toni Sant, when you use MySpace or Wikipedia you are taking part in a major paradigm shift in economics, education, culture and politics.

In other words, everybody can make art. ‘There's a breakdown of the traditional hierarchy where the supposedly learned few pass knowledge down to the many,’ he says.

But this process of making it easy for everyone to create does not mean education has no value: quite the reverse. ‘University education is so special,’ he says. ‘It is the place where we can continue to see what's going on as we do it. It gives us the time and space to critically consider what's going on.’

As a lecturer in performance and creative technologies at the university, he is well placed to study the changes underway. His wife Christine has also been working there for the last year and is now a lecturer in educational studies.

The two had previously lived and worked in New York, though Toni is originally from Malta. They have adjusted to the culture change moving from a ‘cosmopolitan mega-metropolis’ to a seaside town, and say they love Scarborough precisely because it is different.

They were attracted by Scarborough Campus’ innovative approach to arts and new media. They wanted to move, too. ‘After 9/11 we started feeling that New York was not such a nice place to live any more. Additionally the political climate in America felt somewhat oppressive for free thinking individuals like us.’

As for their students, they detect just a hint of mollycoddling. Says Toni: ‘Students here are not always so self-sufficient. To our foreign sensibilities, they have an easier life than their counterparts in a big city like New York.’ On the other hand, with fewer distractions they can concentrate on their work, he admits.

It’s an exciting time to be studying the new democracy of ideas in art. Toni is not concerned that free access will dumb down what is produced. ‘While it may be argued that quality is being compromised because there's a lot of junk along with the good stuff, this will subside in time as the next generation comes to deal with almost everything in society this way,’ he predicts.

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