EVENT 2: Midterm Presentations

   (Hardy) 


       For my event, I attended the midterm presentations. “The last decade or so has seen substantial interdisciplinary activity between the arts and sciences”  (Pepperell).  I thought that interdisciplinary collaboration was clearly represented in presentations I viewed with projects involving AI music, Solar Art, and so on. Viewing my peers' projects, I was immediately struck by how artsy they were. I recall being very hesitant to do anything overtly artsy for I felt as a STEM student it was not my place or I will not execute it well. It helped me realize how much I have internalized the divide between scientists and artists that C.P Snow describes. Viewing my peers’ more artsy projects made me want to have a more arts-focused project for my finals. I will now use this newfound confidence to redesign my final project.  




 

        Joseph Green spoke about AI writing music. I was fascinated by his question of is this art or craft and how that led to some interesting discussions of the implications of AI on human labor. The discussion showed the mixed reactions that automation invokes. I feel this mixed reaction is because humans “don't like to give up our special-ness”  (Brooks).     

 


         Mary Gallo spoke about Solar Art, and I thought it was a brilliant project. It reminded me of Gijs van Bon’s “StreetRover”, which uses robotic technology to create art. In StreetRover’s case, the only benefit is creating art. However, Gallo’s project also helped promote sustainability. 

        The Sci-Fi-inspired project of the “immortality pill” sparked my attention too. I found the use of the telomerase-inspired project to be very unique. I feel as though this is something that actually can be created in the future. Maybe as Prof Vesna’s mentioned in her lectures, this could be like one of the older sci-fi movies that predict the future.  



 


         I would highly recommend my peers go see this event. I think insight into how your peers think can be very inspiring. It helped me form new project ideas and hopefully will do the same for you! Additionally, you also get to see how others are perceiving the class material.  


Works Cited: 


Pepperell, Robert. “Connecting Art and the Brain: An Artist's Perspective on Visual Indeterminacy.” Frontiers, Frontiers, 30 July 2011, www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnhum.2011.00084/ful


Snow, Charles Percy. The two cultures and the scientific revolution: The Rede Lecture, 1959. University Press, 1959.   


Brooks, Rodney. “Robots Will Invade Our Lives.” TED, Feb. 2003, www.ted.com/talks/rodney_brooks_robots_will_invade_our_lives. 


Bon, Gijs van. Gijs Van Bon, 2020, www.gijsvanbon.nl/.  


Vesna, Victoria. “Lecture Part 2.” Math + Art. 12 Oct. 2012. Lecture.   


 Smith, Hardy. CREATE A CULTURE OF NONPROFIT CREATIVITY, 30 Apr. 2018, www.hardysmith.com/Create-a-Culture-of-Nonprofit-Creativity-1-88.html. 

“Caretaker - AI-Generated Music Composed by AIVA.” Performance by CMG Orchestra, YouTube, YouTube, 4 Dec. 2018, www.youtube.com/watch?v=zXzAImRi6Y8. 

TheJacksonlab, director. What Are Telomeres? | Telomere Animation. YouTube, YouTube, 24 Aug. 2020, www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0fRAr-ZHCo. 



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

EVENT 1: Metropolis (1927)

Image
         I attended the watch party for the movie Metropolis.              The movie was a silent black and white sci-fi movie and was produced in 1927. When I was watching the movie, I was marveled at how imaginative the creators were. They were able to visualize robots and the utilization of robots for industrialized jobs even before anything remotely that advanced was created. It made me connect to Prof Vesna’s reference on how movies depict certain technologies even before they existed and how that could have led to the invention of these technologies.        Additionally, I could see that the robots/ technology that they were depicting were not necessarily very advanced compared to the possibilities today. This reinforced Prof Vesna’s comment on how older sci-fi movies now seem tame compared to the new inventions that are present today.  Furthermore, th...
Read more

WEEK 7: Neuroscience + Art

Image
  (Bartolini and Franck Polleux )           This week’s course was extremely insightful and helped me gain a new sense of appreciation for the importance of collaboration between neuroscience and art. The blog below will discuss how neuroscience can be used to enhance artistic perspective, and how art has led to breakthroughs in neuroscience. Additionally, I will also discuss how there continues to be resistance to the collaboration of these two disciplines.  (Taylor)           “ Through neuroscience, we develop a specific understanding of the models of the world that the brain uses to make sense of incoming visual data” (Blaszczyk).   Dr. RamaKrishnan in his lectures discusses how visual perception can be manipulated using this knowledge of neuroscience. I particularly appreciate his example of how we perceive things differently when words are associated with them. Fo...
Read more

WEEK 6: Biotech + Art

Image
                                                                                                         (Hunter)     The pro of Bioart is that it unlocks uncharted territory of potential for both scientific and artistic discoveries. The con is that ethics is a major question. My blog will explore these topics in more detail.        Firstly, bioart opens up the possibility for a new realm of art. Ani Liu, for example, has “...
Read more