In 2002 the University of Tasmania's School of Visual and Performing Arts and The Tasmanian Polytechnic (then TAFE) came together to form The Academy of the Arts, co-located at what was once the Inveresk rail yards. Originally Tasmania's largest industrial site, Inveresk and York Park is now the major cultural precinct in Launceston, Tasmania's northern city. It is home to The Academy of the Arts, the School of Architecture & Design, the School of Fine Furniture, the Australian Technical College and the Aurora Stadium. All these facilities are greatly enhanced by their proximity the Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery (QVMAG). UTAS has two major campuses, one in Hobart and one in Launceston. The Launceston campuses are in Newnham and Inveresk, together catering for approximately 5000 students in the north of the state. rnrn

This case study describes how a postgraduate degree in cross-disciplinary art and design can be conducted in a fully online studio environment. The program comprises a structured sequence of core-courses which contextualise a wide variety of elective choices by illuminating their theoretical, practical and disciplinary connections. Electives include subjects such as creative thinking processes, drawing, sculpture, digital illustration, art curation, textiles, photography, understanding and experiencing art, hologram design, digital animation and graphic design. Students and teachers are represented from across the world and Australia.

The integration of theory within all practical studio courses at an undergraduate level equips students with the skills and knowledge necessary to position their chosen creative direction(s). We argue that critical and theoretical awareness enhances creative production and vice versa in a fluid and dynamic manner. We find that a central part of a Creative Arts education is an appreciation of the agency with which art can transform ways in which cultural issues are conceived and therefore possess an active and performative cultural function. A Creative Arts education should provide a broad introduction to the plurality of contemporary cultural production, encourage critical thinking and develop visual literacy. Meeting these demands requires a balance between structure and experimentation.

For twenty years the foundation or first year visual arts studio at Queensland University of Technology has been run on genuine interdisciplinary lines. With no studio specific areas as such, the course is constructed on conceptual lines largely determined by students emerging interests. The students also determine the media they will use. These student conceptual orientations are structured by projects (one per semester) that are broad and 'soft edged'. Within these projects students are invited to explore their sensibilities as artists not students. What is proposed within this studio study is a mapping of this unique approach. This mapping will explore the approaches and strategies for introducing an interdisciplinary approach in visual arts to undergraduates and explore both the positives and negatives of such a studio approach as well as the rationales for such an approach.

This case study looks at the 2008 trespass 3rd Year Interior Architecture studio at Curtin University. The students' task was to re-think urban space on their terms, to consider the culture, politics, society and micro-economics of urban as interior space, to deploy interior strategies and sensibilities in an unfamiliar, cross disciplinary realm. The context for studio program was Perth where the weather is fabulous, the beaches are the best, the economy is strong but the city is 'boring'. To extend the boundaries of their existing knowledge, students were introduced to other ways of seeing and experiencing city space through a screening of Peter Greenaway�s The Cook the Thief His Wife and Her Lover. A series of readings included topics such as �La Donna �: Agoraphobia, Women and Urban Space�, �Crime�, �Borders�, �Female Fetish and Urban Form�, �Case Study: New Babylon�, �We Deserve a City that Fires up the Imagination�, �CCTV�, �Crime�, �Skateboarding�, �Graffiti�, and �I�ll Take the Recycled, Light-Green One Please�. Collegiality was encouraged between students, and interdisciplinary collaboration was enabled via a stream of guest lecturers and tutors from disciplines including economic development, crime and design, theatre and puppetry, fashion and urban design. No doubt this was a stretch for the IA students. How were they to position their work within the diversity of this framework? This case study presents studio structure, process, outcomes, feedback and reflection in relation to the 2008 trespass studio.

This intensive studio aimed to engage students, collectively and individually, in identifying opportunities and constraints via a process of mapping, interviewing and observing. As an urban design studio students were encouraged to draw from specific site conditions to 'find' a final project. In some cases these projects would result in built outcomes, in others the proposal of community programs and in others long term strategic planning initiatives. The essence of the project was to engage with both the paying client (council) and the inferred client (the community) and develop skills in client liaison, negotiation and plain English presentation while producing a highly considered and resolved architectural or urban design outcome.

The integrated Fine Art program, an initiative between Riverina Institute of TAFE and CSU (2005), was originally available only to local Riverina based-students. The scope of the program has expanded with increasing availability of CSU subjects by Distance Education, realising demand from students in other regional NSW locations since 2008 (Tamworth; Dubbo; Albury and Orange). Students undertake local TAFE programs (as available locally) or TAFE programs as available locally across NSW. Students complete TAFE Advanced Diploma and 10(8) CSU subjects as Studio Minors and Art History subjects depending on year level of entry. The original integrated course structure was based on an integrated TAFE/University model from the Faculty of Business at Griffith University.

This case study provides an overview of a new Bachelor of Digital Media program, which combines TAFE Illawarra study in digital film-making and animation with University of Wollongong (UOW) study in Media Arts. The program is closely integrated so that students can obtain a TAFE Certificate IV at the end of the first year, a TAFE Diploma at the end of the second year and a UOW Bachelor of Digital Media at the end of the third year. The program will begin in 2010 at new purpose built facilities at the UOW Innovation campus. Apart from summarising the structure of the new degree, this case study will also address the process of its development and the various practical issues that have emerged in terms of developing an effective educational partnership.

Collabor8 (C8) 2008 built on Collabor8 Projects (2003 to 2005) developed by Ian McArthur while working as Program Director of Graphic Design at LDHU (Donghua University) and Head Teacher of Art and Design NCI (TAFENSW). Collabor8 2008 formed a pilot study examining the online interactions of ninety-four graphic design and visual communications students from universities and colleges in Australia and China to examine the relationship between cultural background, cognition and media types in collaborative online design education. rnrnThe data gathered revealed a complex interplay of internal and external dynamics suggesting that a disjuncture in many students understanding of was expected of them regardless of media used to deliver the lectures and briefs in the project. Language, divergent student expectations, different levels and styles of knowledge production, and outside forces such as the Sichuan earthquake, are important areas of focus in this study exposing what might be described as multiple realities within the project.rn

This case study describes two elective multidisciplinary courses involving the design, development and fabrication of a built work to a brief, timeframe and budget on the main campus of the University of New South Wales. The courses involved collaboration between three Faculties of the University, namely, the Faculty of the Built Environment, the College of Fine Arts and the Faculty of Engineering.

Keywords: interdisciplinary, creative arts, core courses, third year
This case study describes the role of a number of core courses in the third year of a Bachelor of Creative Arts degree at the University of Southern Queensland. In a major restructure of the Bachelor of Creative Arts degree, the disciplines of Music, Creative Media, Theatre and Visual Arts are linked into a single degree program and students have the opportunity to choose courses and majors across disciplines in consultation with program staff. The core third year courses described in this case study provide opportunities for students to work with peers across disciplines and to explore pathways into the profession. A strategy for encouraging hybridity through cross-disciplinary collaboration in the production of arts for public consumption is the focus of this innovative curriculum design.

Porosity Studio is a special interdisciplinary course for undergraduate and postgraduate students in Fine Art, Design, Media Studies, Architecture, Urban Design, Landscape Architecture, Planning and Engineering. This intensive studio centres on a critical investigation of contemporary urban space and the intersections of public and private space, and begins with the need for architecture to be porous in relation to pubic space, hence the name 'Porosity.' Often held in overseas locations, with the collaboration of local institutions, the course places student artists, architects, designers and engineers into a collaborative studio on a level plane to develop collaborative art and design interventions rethinking the nature of public space and architecture in the city.rnStudents are encouraged to bring their developing modes of practice, and spatial intelligence, into the studio and test them at another scale within the city.

The Art and Natural Environment units form an introduction to the fundamental themes, concepts and principals central to engagement with, and creative representation of, the natural and altered environments in Tasmania. rnrnCentral to the delivery of each unit is the experience gained during two four-day field trips to remote areas of Tasmania.rnrnThe two subjects complement each other, as well as forming core units of the Graduate Certificate, Graduate Diploma, and Masters of Art, Design and Environment. The units are experientially based, and medium non-specific, in order to facilitate interdisciplinary practice and creative problem solving.rn