Emil Polyak is an associate professor in the College of Media Arts & Design at Drexel University. He received a master’s degree in Cross-Disciplinary Art and Design from the University of New South Wales in Australia. With background in animation, interactive media, and digital arts, Polyak is actively exploring intersections of science, engineering and art. His work is focusing on research informed design practice with emerging and experimental creative technologies to expand disciplinary boundaries and to create meaningful experiences. The overarching goal of his scholarship is to reimagine creative practice with the possibilities and implications of computational creativity, and to find new connections between emerging digital trends and artistic approaches to tell stories. Polyak is interested in producing experiences that are emotionally impactful and present ideas in new and surprising ways as an interplay between machines and humans. One aspect of this work has been to research how linear narrative gets transformed through improvised performances, and to understand the effect of the simulated reality on the outcome.

Polyak has collaborated with engineers, scientists, and musicians on various projects that resulted in exhibitions and in research. His work was shown in museums, at festivals and conferences such as at ACM Siggraph, Smithsonian Institution, North Carolina Museum of Art, and the Museum for Contemporary Art and Design.