Performing arts as a tool for university education during a pandemic: Moving from an in vivo to an in vitro modality

This paper analyses how a course on improvisation and collective creation in engineering addressed to master's students in Switzerland moved online. The course offers an experience in the field of performing arts, through embodied and situated activities, and the opportunity to reflect on the process of collective creation, a fundamental aspect of engineering practice often neglected in engineering training. The restrictions imposed by the 2020 pandemic forced its migration to an online format. We explore whether it is possible to maintain online a pedagogical proposal centered on embodied and face-to-face interaction, and what such a course might bring to the students. Using data collected during Spring 2020 (especially a focus group, video-recorded feedbacks and reflective diaries written by the students), we analyze the continuities and discontinuities between the two modalities. We show how the socio-material transformations implied by the online interactions altered the interactions taking place, discuss the resultant opportunities and novelties offered by the online modality. We highlight that the apparent success of this migration to an online format overshadows the strong collective efforts needed from both students and teachers to maintain the key features of the course (playful experimentation, being inspired by others, horizontality of relations, trust, collective practice, improvisation).