Digital images rely on text in their creation, dissemination and categorisation, as well as in their broader uses. This course looks beyond traditional approaches to digital culture to explore memes, datasets, metadata and prompts to generate images. Across the five sessions, we will consider a range of perspectives on the relationship between digital images and text.
Course format
The sessions take place on Zoom and will include presentations, group discussions and short exercises. Lectures will be recorded and available through a shared folder, along with slideshows and any other relevant resources.
Who is this for?
This course is open to anyone interested in photography and art, with a particular and/or growing interest in digital. No prior knowledge necessary.
Led by curator and researcher Jon Uriarte.
Details on how to access the sessions will be confirmed upon registration. Please check your junk folders if you haven't received an email from TPG staff confirming your place.
Image & Text on Tue 10 Feb at 18.30-20.00 GMT
We begin by exploring the evolving relationship between digital images and text. Moving beyond early frameworks that treat images as text (eg sequencing or captioning), we look at contemporary approaches that understand images as code – highly flexible objects that can be transformed, compressed and reinterpreted across media and platforms. We’ll discuss recent practices and topics such as glitching, AI systems and the increasing ways images are re-shaped, produced, circulated and perceived today.
Metadata on Tue 17 Feb at 18.30-20.00 GMT
This week focuses on metadata, data visualisation and shifting politics of traceability. We examine how metadata embeds ownership, location and behavioural information – and how new standards (such as authenticity frameworks) are being introduced in response to misinformation.
Memes on Tue 24 Feb at 18.30-20.00 GMT
In this session we explore the cultural and political role of memes in shaping narratives and public discourse. Memes – whether images, GIFs, short-form videos or other remixable formats – function as a key grammar of online communication. We examine how they evolve through participatory cultures, how they operate as tools for identity, resistance, humour and persuasion. We consider the role of memes in contemporary information ecosystems – their influence in public opinion, electoral politics, misinformation and platform-specific subcultures.
Datasets on Tue 3 Mar at 18.30-20.00 GMT
This week centres on the relationship between images and datasets, with focus on annotation practices and the way that influences how machines interpret them. We explore how tagging, labelling and scraping shape what machines learn to see – and whose perspectives become encoded as defaults. We will discuss current details around ethics, copyright, consent, bias and the concept of “ground truths” in training AI.
Prompting on Tue 10 Mar at 18.30-20.00 GMT
We conclude with image-generation and contemporary prompt-based practices. We examine how text prompts function as a form of authorship, instruction and negotiation with generative systems. We introduce current models and interfaces, how they differ in capability, bias and aesthetic tendencies. We will also consider blurring boundaries between photography, illustration and computation, reflecting on the future of visual literacy as generated imagery becomes more ubiquitous and harder to distinguish from the “real”.
Biography
Jon Uriarte is a curator, educator, writer and artist based in Donostia - San Sebastián, Spain. He co-created and co-curates Screen Walks with Marco de Mutiis (digital curator at Photomuseum Winterthur), a series of live streams guided by artists, researchers and curators using the screen as their medium launched by Fotomuseum Winterthur in Switzerland and The Photographers’ Gallery in London, where he curated the digital programme between 2019 and 2023.
He has also curated Getxophoto International Image Festival in Getxo, Spain, and DONE, a programme launched by FotoColectania in Barcelona, Spain, looking at the changing role of photography in the digital and networked era. Jon is a guest lecturer at several Spanish universities and schools, and he regularly writes essays, reviews and articles for different magazines and publications.
Bursaries
A number of partial bursaries covering 50 per cent of course fees will be awarded on a first come basis. Applicants who wish to be considered for a partial bursary should submit a statement (max. 500 words) to projects@tpg.org.uk, outlining how Explorations in Digital Spaces 2026 would contribute to their professional development. Successful applicants will be notified within a week of submission.
We actively encourage applications from groups who are currently underrepresented in the cultural sector in the UK. This includes people who identify as D/deaf, disabled* and neurodivergent; those with caring responsibilities; candidates from Black, Asian and ethnically diverse backgrounds; and arts and culture professionals whose career development has been negatively impacted by Covid-19, prioritising independent artists, freelancers and those made redundant/at risk of redundancy since 2020.
*The Equality Act 2010 defines a disabled person as someone who has a physical or mental impairment, and the impairment has a substantial and long-term adverse effect on their ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities. Sharing that you are disabled will not be used in any way in judging the quality of your application.
Ticketing
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