In AP Art & Design, experimentation is trying out new materials, methods, or ideas, guided by your inquiry questions, to discover what your work can become. It is one of three required evidences (practice, experimentation, revision) that AP Readers look for in your Sustained Investigation (Topic 3.2).
Experimentation is the act of deliberately trying things you haven't tried before. New materials, new techniques, new compositions, new ways of approaching your inquiry question. In AP Art & Design, it's not random play. The CED is specific that experimentation must be guided by questions or inquiry (EK 3.E.1). That means each experiment should be a response to your guiding question, like "What happens to my theme of memory if I work on translucent surfaces instead of canvas?"
Here's the part that trips people up. Experimentation isn't just something you do; it's something you have to show and describe. Your Sustained Investigation is scored partly on visible evidence of practice, experimentation, and revision across your 15 images, plus written statements that connect those experiments back to your inquiry. A failed experiment that pushed your investigation forward is portfolio gold. A polished piece with no visible risk-taking behind it is a missed scoring opportunity.
Experimentation lives in Unit 3: Present, specifically Topic 3.2: Sustained Investigations. It directly supports learning objective AP Art Design 3.2.B, which asks you to describe in writing how your sustained investigation shows evidence of practice, experimentation, and revision guided by questions or inquiry. It also feeds AP Art Design 3.2.A, because your experiments often reveal how your initial questions changed over time, and reflecting on that change is exactly what 3.2.A asks for.
Practically, this is one of the highest-stakes terms in the course. AP Art & Design has no written exam. Your score comes from your portfolio, and the Sustained Investigation (worth 60% of your score) is evaluated on whether Readers can actually see experimentation happening across your images and read about it in your written evidence. If your 15 images all look like variations of the same safe idea, you're leaving points on the table.
Keep studying AP Art & Design Unit 3
Visual cheatsheet
view galleryIteration (Unit 3)
Iteration is experimentation with a memory. You try something, look at the result, adjust, and try again. A single experiment is one data point; a string of iterations is the visible storyline of your investigation that Readers can follow across your images.
Innovation (Unit 3)
Innovation is what experimentation produces when it works. You can't plan to be innovative; you experiment enough times that something genuinely new emerges. In your portfolio, innovation is the destination and experimentation is the documented trip.
Mixed Media (Unit 3)
Mixed media is one of the most natural ways to make experimentation visible. Combining materials (paint over photo transfers, found objects in ceramics) creates obvious before-and-after evidence that you stepped outside one medium to answer your inquiry question.
AP Art & Design is scored through your portfolio, not a sit-down test, so experimentation gets "tested" by AP Readers evaluating your Sustained Investigation against the rubric. They're checking two things. First, do your 15 images show visible evidence of practice, experimentation, and revision? Second, does your written evidence describe those activities and tie them to your inquiry questions, exactly as EK 3.E.1 lays out?
Practice questions on this term hit the same angles: why experimenting with different materials and techniques matters in a Sustained Investigation, what an artist working exclusively with found objects might be exploring, and why embracing failure produces more diverse responses. The common thread is that experimentation is purposeful, question-driven risk-taking, and that documenting the misses matters as much as documenting the hits. Use clear, concise language in your written evidence (the CED's own phrasing) to name what you tried, what you learned, and how it pushed your question forward.
The CED lists practice, experimentation, and revision as three separate evidences, and Readers look for all three. Experimentation is trying something new (a material, method, or approach you haven't used) to see what happens. Revision is going back to existing work and changing it based on what you learned. If you swap watercolor for ink, that's experimentation. If you rework that ink piece's composition after a critique, that's revision. Your written evidence should make clear you did both.
In AP Art & Design, experimentation means trying new materials, methods, or ideas, and it must be guided by your inquiry questions, not done at random.
Experimentation is one of three required evidences in the Sustained Investigation, alongside practice and revision, under learning objective AP Art Design 3.2.B.
You have to make experimentation visible in your 15 Sustained Investigation images and describe it in your written evidence using clear, concise language.
Failed experiments count. Documenting what didn't work and how it changed your direction is strong evidence of an authentic investigation.
Experimentation tries something new, revision improves existing work, and iteration chains experiments together. Readers want to see all of these across your portfolio.
It's the process of trying new materials, methods, or ideas, guided by your inquiry questions, to push your Sustained Investigation forward. The CED (EK 3.E.1) requires you to show it in your images and describe it in writing.
No, and they can actually help. AP Readers score evidence of experimentation and revision, so a documented experiment that failed but changed your direction shows exactly the inquiry-driven process the rubric rewards. Hiding your misses just makes your investigation look thinner.
Experimentation is trying something new, like switching from acrylic to collage or testing a new firing technique. Revision is returning to existing work and improving it. The CED treats them as separate evidences, so your written statements should show both happening.
Include images that document trials, material tests, and varied approaches (not just finished pieces), then use your written evidence to name what you tried and how your inquiry question guided it. Process images and side-by-side comparisons make experimentation obvious to Readers.
Yes. Under learning objective AP Art Design 3.2.B, experimentation must be guided by your questions or inquiry. Random technique-hopping with no connection to your guiding question reads as unfocused, not experimental.
Connect this key term to the AP exam workflow: review the course, practice questions, and check related study tools.