What Comes to Mind: Memory Traces|Engrams from The Anatomy Lesson (EXTRA CREDIT EVENT BLOG)

The flyer.

For my fourth and final event I visited the What Comes to Mind: Memory Traces|Engrams from The Anatomy Lesson exhibit at the Art and Science Gallery in the California NanoSystems Institute. The artist, Joyce Cutler-Shaw was a small interesting woman with incredible drawings. Walking into the gallery I saw the variety of her work. Shaw had brain scans, photographs, 3-D images, and hand-drawings spread all over the gallery. 

I think I look normal here.

Her work truly captured the themes of our course because of the mixture of science and technology her exhibit demonstrated. Her gallery had brain scan images that were fused with other art pieces that gave her work a "dream world" feeling. 

After personally speaking with Shaw I was able to find out that many of her 3-D images weren't being displayed because the facilities didn't offer the proper equipment. I was sad to learn this but I was still very impressed by the nature of Shaw's work. Her hand drawings were most intriguing. The drawings reminded me of the first weeks of the course when we learned about anatomy and the human body.

A bad quality image of the 3-D images.
Shaw mentioned that properly
set up they would show as
movies.

The awesome hand-drawings.
Here they are part of a printed book.
The actual drawings are much larger.

Overall, I was very impressed with the completeness and complexity of Shaw's work. Her collection gave an interesting perspective on the progression of life to death. If anyone has the chance to view her full collection, 3-D images and all I highly recommend it.

Resources

Cutler-Shaw, Joyce. What Comes to Mind: Memory Traces|Engram from The Anatomy Lesson. 2013. Flyer. n.p. Web. 7 Dec 2013.

Typhoon Relief Benefit Show (EVENT BLOG)

Me with a weird eyebrow.

By far my favorite event this quarter was the Typhoon Relief Benefit Show held in order to raise funds for typhoon Haiyan. The event was a mixture of cultural pieces performed by various groups on campus including the UCLA Hawaii Club, Tinig Choral, and various others.

At the beginning of the event there was a PowerPoint set up with various pictures taken after typhoon Haiyan hit the Philippines. I had a hard time dealing with many of the images that were shown because they invoked strong feelings within me.

This was one of the first similarities I found with the course. The benefit show sometimes made me uncomfortable because the topics that were brought up were very serious and heartbreaking. Just like different art pieces I have seen in the course the benefit show invoked an emotion within me that made me feel a bit distraught.


The next similarity I saw between the course and the benefit show was the mixture of art and technology. For some of the performances the correlations between art and science weren't very obvious but for other performances, especially the musicians, the correlations were more apparent.
Musicians that went to stage depended on the technology available to them. They needed microphones, and a proper sound system. Many of them also needed special electrical instruments.
Overall, the Typhoon Relief Benefit Show, was a fantastic event. It is unfortunate that the event had to take place after such a drastic typhoon but I hope my contribute made a difference.






Resources
The Pilipina/o Community of UCLA. Typhoon Relief Benefit Show. 2013. Flyer. n.p. Web. 2 Dec 2013.

DOW JONES - Gareth Walsh (EVENT BLOG)

Just me taking another bad picture.

The first art/science related event I attended was Gareth Walsh’s DOW JONES exhibit held on October 31^st in the Art and Science Exhibit in the California NanoSystems Institute.

Walsh’s exhibit featured a real-time singing portrait of the US Stock Market. The real-time singing portrait showcase stock market employees singing the highs and lows of the U.S. economy.

Gareth Walsh’s exhibit was interesting because of his alteration of the (visual) Dow Jones Industrial Average. Walsh took what was only interpreted though visuals and made it an auditory source.

I was able to relate Walsh’s exhibit to the content material for our class because of Walsh’s mixture of art, which in this case was the art of singing, and technology, the real-time portrait and various pitch measurements.

Walsh’s exhibit is unique in the sense that it is difficult to explain because it was very auditory. Unlike an art piece, Walsh depended on his technology in order to showcase his art.

While I can appreciate an exhibit such as Walsh’s I found Walsh’s piece difficult to enjoy because many of the employees he featured were not very good singers. However, I think his idea was interesting and shows a lot of promise for future expansion.

Just in case anyone wants to view a piece of the Walsh real-time DOW JONES exhibit I posted a link below. 

http://gareth-walsh.com/

Resources

Gareth Walsh. Gareth-walsh.com. Web. 13 Dec. 2013.

UCLA Design Media Arts. Dma.ucla.edu. Web. 13 Dec. 2013.

THE HAMMER....Museum (EVENT BLOG)

The Hammer Museum, located on the corner of Wilshire and Westwood Blvd in Los Angeles, California stands as a concrete block. From the outside it looks nothing more than a large parking structure but the inside couldn't be more different. When you walk in through the main entrance, the first thing you see is a huge painting that spreads from the foot of the stairs all the way up to the high ceilings.

Figure 1

Heavy Lights, by Maya Hayuk spreads four walls, each measuring 186 x 292 inches. As a mural, her artwork contains many lines and geometric shapes all joining together like a woven cloth.

The uniqueness of Hayuk's piece is shown through the drippings of paint. The drippings can be seen as an example of carelessness that arises when an artist takes on an endeavor as large as a mural.

Hayuk's piece is relevant to the topics covered in our DESMA 9 class because of her usage of lines and symmetry. Her piece, in many ways, is deeply based on mathematics and geometry. The different lines Hayuk uses create various shapes that give here work visual depth.

Figure 2

Near Hayuk's piece was another interesting art project that wasn't a showing at all. A wooden table designed by Marmol Radziner was originally placed at the Hammer as a way for adults and children to create their own blocked sculptures. The table comes complete with multiple slots to hold the sculpture's base together and also has 4 drawers complete with block sets.

I thoroughly enjoyed trying to create a sculpture with all the pieces at the Radziner table and I am very glad the museum had such an interesting  and engaging piece open to the public.

I would recommend a visit to the Hammer museum and I would highly recommend all visitors to try building a sculpture at the wooden table located in the museum lobby.

SOURCES

<Figure 1>

Heavy Lights, 2012 (detail). Paint on walls. Four walls, each 186 x 292 in. (472 x 743 cm). Bonnefantenmuseum, Maastricht, Netherlands. Photography by 007.

<Figure 2>

Blocks. Marmol Radziner. <http://www.marmol-radziner.com/community/hammer-k.a.m.p>

Space—the Final Frontier

“Space—the final frontier.” Anyone that has seen some kind of major space age film is familiar with those words. Besides the center of the Earth, almost every inch of our planet’s landscape has been explored or at least mapped out by a satellite. The only truly “untouched” frontier would be space.

Space…immensely large and unknown, has been the center of many myths and visions spanning from extraterrestrial life to human colonization. An idea that I believe to be relatively new however, is the use of space as a medium for the eternal memory of the people of Earth.

Nanotechnology + Art

Brainbow

Figure 1

In 2007 the world changed. In a research laboratory someone in the state of Masachussets, Harvard scientists devised a way to color mouse neurons to help them trace the neuron’s long and intricate arms. Their results became what is now known as the Brainbow effect.

With the help of at least 3 different fluorescent proteins, scientists were able to paint neurons in a variety of different colors making the tracing of neurons much simpler. This tracing has helped the phenomena known as brain mapping.

Figure 2

Earlier this year, in his state of the union address, President Obama talked about the importance of the mapping of the brain. Brainbow, has significantly helped the progress of brain mapping but there are those that oppose it.

Figure 3

Just as the controversy the Human Genome Project received, brain mapping has created disputes between scientists because of the involvement of the government. Some scientists believe structuring and in a way limiting the way scientists work in order to gain results is counter-productive.

This idea of how scientists should work is very interesting since it relates directly to artists. In many ways, Brainbow has opened the door to a discussion on how scientists should be allowed to work. Scientists like artists want to be free of the chains an institutionalized world forces them to work in. Scientists, like artists want to have their own creative control.

Resources

"Brainbow." Center for Brain Science. Harvard University. Web. 18 Nov 2013. <http://cbs.fas.harvard.edu/science/connectome-project/brainbow>.

Hayman, John. "Art and Neurosciene." queens.ox.ac.uk. University of Oxford , Oxford UK, n.d. Web. 18 Nov 2013. <http://www.queens.ox.ac.uk/academics/hyman/files/art_and_neuroscience.pdf>.

Greenwood, Veronique. Fly Over the 'Brainbow'. 2011. Photograph. MIT Technology ReviewWeb. 18 Nov 2013. <http://www.technologyreview.com/photogallery/423111/fly-over-the-brainbow/>.

NPR STAFF. "Somewhere Over The Brainbow: The Journey To Map the Human Brain." NPR. 31 Mar 2013: n. page. Web. 18 Nov. 2013. <http://www.npr.org/2013/03/31/175858397/somewhere-over-the-brainbow-the-journey-to-map-the-human-brain>.

Reueller, Peter. “‘Brainbow,’ version 2.0.” Harvard Gazette. 15 May 2013 Harvard University. Web. 18 Nov. 2013 <http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2013/05/brainbow-version-2-0/>

Images

Fig 1 < http://www.technologyreview.com/photogallery/423111/fly-over-the-brainbow/>

Fig 2 < http://www.npr.org/2013/03/31/175858397/somewhere-over-the-brainbow-the-journey-to-map-the-human-brain>

Fig 3 <http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2013/05/brainbow-version-2-0/>