The Art and Science Laboratory seeks to redefine the social role of art and the artist in the context of applied collaboration with focused scientific research. Our desire is to articulate an art of daily consequence and creative activism that is integrated with life in a utilitarian way, while promoting scientific understanding. In many ways ASL’s central interest is to transcend the categories of art and science. Rather than merely encouraging the familiar vectors of disciplinary specialization, ASL seeks to facilitate networks of interdisciplinary resocialization. We regard this interdisciplinary thinking as an historical and pragmatic necessity. 

ASL is dedicated to exploring how digital code and computing tools define a new type of human perceptual space and a new potential for the creative imagination. We actively encourage all facets of the electronic and digital arts and sciences as a new creative domain for human thought and imagination through direct collaboration between artists, scientists, and technologists. The Laboratory is not only dedicated to the understanding that the digital computer has become the predominant tool for most artistic and expressive genre but also the context through which a critical and creative influence upon the evolution of technology can be maintained. Digital computing has also become the primary locale for a reunifying discourse between art and science.

The principal areas of research and education at ASL include: electronic arts history and practice, post-cinematic aesthetics, robotics and haptics, sound art, chaos and nonlinear dynamics, bioacoustics, human and machine interface, video and web art, complex and adaptive systems, interactive and programmable space, distributed device network programming, environmental media construction and protocols, compositional linguistics, evolutionary processes, and environmental conservation and education.