Art and Tech: Our Stanford Experience 2025

This summer, my brother and I got to be part of a Stanford summer session about art, design, and technology, and honestly, it was way more useful and informative than we expected.

We were expecting a difficult and crammed coding class, but it turned out to be about how art, identity, ethics, and technology all connect. We learned how to code in p5.js, using it to create generative art with code, used Teachable Machine to train our own AIs and mods, and even read texts like “A Cyborg Manifesto” that made us question what it even means to be human in a tech world.

In week two, things got real (and physical) with the Circuit Playground Express. We built interactive and tangible devices that lit up, reacted to sound, and even responded to movement. It was hands-on in the best way possible. Although there was some trouble having to take in so much information at once, it was fun to even test small codes on the circuit.

The final project was our favorite part of the class because we combined everything we’d learned to build something that felt personal and meaningful.

I created a a project about dance, a form of art I am extremely passionate about. On p5.js I made a silhouette-based dance camera using code and real-time input.

My brother created his project about sports, specifically soccer, which is his passion. He made an animation on p5.js about AI incorporated in sports using facial recognition.

We only had a week to build these projects, so they were rough drafts of our full vision, but we were proud to see how far we had come and how all our skills came together in the final assignment.

More than anything, Stanford taught us that technology isn’t just about building stuff, it’s about expressing who you are and asking better questions. We left feeling more creative, more curious, and kind of like baby cyborgs. In a good way.