Vol. 38, No. 18

3-1-2006
By: Susan Wittstock Dalzell

Where art meets science

The dark room on the first floor of Haskett Hall looks like it ought to be a physics laboratory. A large worktable has a complicated arrangement of stands with mirrors and beam splitters used to direct the room's two diode lasers. The set-up resembles a high-tech pinball game.

The instructor, Harris Kagan, is a professor of physics, but the courses taught in the classroom aim to create art, not experiments. The brightly lit, white-walled room that leads into the lab displays framed samples of student work created in the lab: intricate holograms that glow in a reality that appears to be nearly a half-foot in depth and dimension but exists only in the space of a couple of inches.

Artwork that illustrates how science intersects with art is the norm for exhibitions sponsored by the Department of Art's Art and Technology program each quarter. Echo Chimeric, the winter quarter exhibition planned for March 9-10, is no exception.

Seeing the exhibition is a limited-time-offer type of opportunity. Echo Chimeric is open from just 5-9 p.m. March 9 and 10 a.m.-4 p.m. March 10. Student videos will be screened in 211 Haskett Hall from 7-9 p.m. March 9.

The quarterly exhibitions, officially intended for the Haskett Hall gallery and sound stage, have a way of migrating to locations throughout the building. "The gallery ends up totally packed and student work ends up in the hallways," said Amy Youngs, assistant professor of art and program head for art and technology. "We're offering a lot of classes this quarter, so the show should be a pretty big one this winter."

The work is created primarily by undergraduates for a number of introductory and advanced art and technology classes, including courses on digital imaging, digital video, 3-D modeling and computer sculpture, 3-D animation, holography, new media robotics and digital input/output.

The shows are eclectic. The submission process isn't very regimented - Youngs won't necessarily know what work is going up for display until the night before. "It's an effort for students and instructors. I always tell students it's really them putting on the show," she said.

Any student who is taking an art and technology class is in the show. "Typically they display their final projects," Youngs said. "It tends to be a really open-ended project. It really depends on what they're learning and what their interests are."

Creativity and innovation is the name of the game, and the exhibition is intended to showcase the challenges students have overcome in using technology as an art-making tool.

For students studying digital imagery, the challenge is to take images they've created on computer and, somehow, release the art from the monitor's screen. "For the show, they need to output what they've created. Sometimes they create something sculptural, sometimes they do projections or videos. It's exciting to see what they come up with," Youngs said. "The final project for one student was projecting an image onto a block of ice. He created an audio piece about global warming to run with the art."

Much of the artwork features commentary, in one form or another, on the world. Animation shorts that will be screened aren't necessarily cartoons. "Because we're in an art program and not design, the characters tend to be a lot more abstract. A lot of the students working in this medium are exploring concepts linked to ideas like community and nature vs. machines," Youngs said.

Sharing those ideas with an audience for the exhibition is a great opportunity for the young artists. "All the students come," Youngs said. "Many bring friends, their parents and significant others. It's pretty fun."
Next year, some of the work displayed may reflect yet another innovation. "We're working on developing a class on podcasting," she said. "Change is really a big part of what we respond to."

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