- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Jacobs will discuss her newly published book, “Jonas Salk: a Life,” which chronicles the life of whom she describes as “one of America's most beloved and decorated scientific heroes.”
The LASER event, to be held from 7 to 9 p.m. in Room 3001 of the Plant and Environmental Sciences Building, will feature four speakers from the arts and sciences, who will present 20-minute talks on several disciplines, including medicine, visual art and astrophysics.
The event is free and open to the public. It is affiliated with the UC Davis Art/Science Fusion, co-founded by entomologist/artist Diane Ullman, professor of entomology at UC Davis, and self-described rock artist Donna Billick.
Jacobs, who currently cares for U.S. military cancer patients at the Palo Alto Veterans Medical Center, is the Ben and A. Jess Shenson Professor of Medicine (emeritus) at Stanford University. A native of Kingsport, Tenn., she studied medicine at Washington University in St. Louis. As a professor at Stanford University, she engaged in teaching, cancer research, and patient care. She received numerous awards for excellence in patient care and teaching, as well as the Distinguished Alumni Award from Washington University.
LASER organizer Anna Davidson serves as the moderator. She received her doctorate in the UC Davis Department of Plant Sciences and is currently a master of fine arts student at UC Davis.
Other speakers, all from the local or Bay Area, are:
8:10-8:35 p.m.: Rachel Clarke, artist and educator teaching new media art at California State University, Sacramento, will speak on “Merging Spaces,” about her latest art work, which combines physical and virtual modes of making
8:35-9 p.m.: Andreas Albrecht, professor and chair of the UC Davis Department of Physics, will speak on “What Is Time.” He is a leading theoretical physicist who specializes in understanding the origins of the universe will be talking about “time.”
In his origami talk, Lang says he will discuss the techniques used in mathematical origami design, which range from the abstruse to the highly approachable. “I will describe the geometric concepts led to the solution of a broad class of origami folding problems – specifically, the problem of efficiently folding a shape with an arbitrary number and arrangement of flaps.”
Lang holds a doctorate in applied physics from California Institute of Technology (Caltech), and during his work at NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Spectra Diode Laboratories, and JDS Uniphase, authored or co-authored more than 100 papers and 50 patents in lasers and optoelectronics as well as authoring, co-authoring, or editing 14 books and a CD-ROM on origami.
Clarke's work involves video and animation, installation, augmented reality and experimental 3D, and has been shown in galleries, museums, new media art festivals and film screenings nationally and internationally.
Professor Albrecht says that “Time is a central part of everyday life, yet it can still seem very mysterious.” He will discuss time from a physicist's point of view “in a way that takes us from every day experiences to deep questions about the cosmos.” He is a member of the new Center for Quantum Mathematics and Physics at UC Davis.
Related Links:
For more information on the program, see
https://www.facebook.com/events/1732840033613610/
For directions:
http://www.plantsciences.ucdavis.edu/plantsciences/visitors/map.htm
Contact information:
Anna Davidson: adavidson@ucdavis.edu
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
The site is a change from the usual meeting place. (See Asmundson Hall on campus map)
The event, free and open to the public, will begin with socializing and networking from 6:30 to 7.
The lineup of speakers:
7 to 7:25: John Albeck, UC Davis assistant professor of molecular and cellular biology, will speak on "The Deep Thoughts and Inner Lives of Cells." He will discuss living cell cinemotography.
7:25 to 8:10: Elia Vargas, an Oakland-based artist, will cover "Signal Flow: Bodies, Boundaries and the Phenomenology of Information." Vargas investigates new technologies of human identity, and is interested in culture, code, cities and cells as new landscapes and new organisms--or the narrative byproduct.
8:10 to 8:35: Danielle Tullman-Ercek, UC Berkeley professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering will discuss "Synthetic Biology: The Challenge and Potential of Engineering Living Systems."
8:35 to 9 p.m.: Rhonda Holberton, Oakland-based artist, will cover "From the Other Side of the Screen." She will discuss the complex relationships that arise when technologies developed for combat are integrated into civilian applications.
The LASERS are an international program of evening gatherings that bring artists and scientists together for informal presentations and conversation with an audience.
The UC Davis LASER is affiliated with the UC Davis Art Science Fusion Program, which was co-founded and co-directed by entomologist/artist Diane Ullman and artist Donna Billick. Ullman is a professor of entomology with the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology. Mosaic-ceramic artist Billick of Davis, a self-described "rock artist," holds a master's degree in genetics from UC Davis.
For more information:
Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/events/450142691817307/
Leonardo:
http://www.leonardo.info/isast/laser.html
http://www.scaruffi.com/leonardo/
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
The event (LASER is an acronym for Leonardo Art Science Evening Rendezvous) is coordinated and moderated by Anna Davidson of the UC Davis Art/Science Fusion Program, which was co-founded by entomologist/artist Diane Ullman, professor in the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology, and self-described "rock artist" Donna Billick, now retired.
Davidson, currently seeking her master's degree in fine arts at UC Davis, received her Ph.D. earlier this year from UC Davis in plant sciences, studying plant ecophysiology. She continues to study the biological world using both artistic and scientific approaches.
The schedule:
6:30 to 7 p.m.
Socializing and networking
Venkatesan Sundaresan, a plant sciences professor at UC Davis, will speak on “Mysteries of the Silent Kingdom: Sticking to One's Roots, Managing Hormones and Spreading Genes”
Biography: Sundaresan, a professor in the UC Davis Plant Biology and Plant Sciences departments, for the past 10 years. did his undergraduate studies in India, graduate studies in the United States: Ph.D in biophysics (Harvard University,) and postdoctoral research in plant genetics (UC Berkeley). He carried out research on fundamental genetic mechanisms in plants, first as a faculty at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, New York, then at Singapore as founding director of the Institute of Molecular Agrobiology. A fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, he is also a Fulbright awardee, and served as program director (biological sciences) at the National Science Foundation. He is on on the editorial boards of several journals. Other interests: the arts, especially music, and its intersection with science.
Robin Hill, art professor at UC Davis, will speak on “Idea Cultivation in the Studio.”
Abstract: Hill will discuss the cultivation of ideas and approaches to making and meaning in her art work. Working with ideas of wonder and phenomena, Hill investigates the aesthetic properties of materials. She looks at how meaning is formed through the re-contextualization of familiar objects in unfamiliar configurations.
Biography: Hill is an artist and art professor at UC Davis. Her primary medium is sculpture, which crosses disciplinary boundaries. She makes objects, photographs, and drawings. She is interested in the ways in which two and three-dimensional art practices inform each other. Hill is represented by Lennon Weinberg, Inc., New York.
She is the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts, individual artist fellowship in sculpture, two Pollock-Krasner Foundation Fellowships, and two New York Foundation for the Arts fellowships. Hill is a former fellow of the Davis Humanities Institute for her research on "The Poetics and Politics of Place." Solo exhibitions include Multiplying the Variations, Lennon, Weinberg, Inc. (New York) 2004 and at the University Art Gallery, California State University, Stanislaus, 2006; Kardex, another year in LA (Los Angeles), 2006; Drawing the Line, Don Soker Contemporary Art (San Francisco), 2007; Robin Hill, Jay Jay Gallery (Sacramento), 2008. Case Discussions, Lennon Weinberg 2012, Snowflake, another year in LA, 2012 Slide Carousel, Ramon's Tailor, and 2014 among others. For more information: Robin Hill website.
7:50 to 8:10 p.m.
Break: Networking/socializing. During the break, presentations will be given. "Anyone can have 30 seconds to share their work, or announce an exhibition, show, idea, etc.," said Davidson.
Chris Dewees, retired marine fisheries specialist at UC Davis, will speak on “Passion for Fish: When East Meets West."
Abstract: This illustrated talk will give insights into two-way communication between scientists and artists.
Biography: Dewees is a San Francisco native with a lifelong passion for fish. His career has included commercial fishing and 35 years as the statewide marine fisheries specialist at UC Davis. His fisheries science accomplishments blended fisheries biology with the human dimensions of fisheries management. When first exposed to the Japanese art of gyotaku, he said he was hooked. "Combining my fisheries expertise with this art form gives me a very balanced life and a way to communicate my passion for fish to others," he says. The art has led to shows and adventures around the world including the Smithsonian. Dewees received his bachelor of science degree from the University of Redlands in biology and speech; his master's degree from Humboldt State University in fisheries; and his doctorate at UC Davis in ecology.
Nanette Wylde, professor of art and art history at California State University, Chico, will speak on “Instigating Some Kind of Action: Interactive Projects Online and Off.”
Biography: Wylde is an artist, writer and cultural worker making socially reflective, language-based works generally of hybrid media. She holds a bachelor's degree in behavioral science from San Jose State University and a MFA in Interactive Multimedia and Printmaking from Ohio State University. At California State University, Chico, she developed and heads the Digital Media/Electronic Arts Program. She is represented by the 23 Sandy Gallery, Portland, Ore.; Central Booking, Brooklyn, N.Y.; and Vamp and Tramp, Birmingham, Ala. More information is on her website.
Related Links:
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
The next LASER-UC Davis event, or Leonardo Art Science Evening Rendezvous, is set for Thursday night, Aug. 7 in Room 3001 of the Plant and Environmental Sciences building, UC Davis campus. Sponsored by the UC Davis Art Science Fusion Program, it will begin with socializing and networking from 6:30 to 7 p.m., and then followed by four presentations, announced coordinator/moderator Anna Davidson, an instructor for the UC Davis Art Science Fusion Program. The event is free and open to the public.
The program:
7 to 7:25:
Eve Warnock and Kate Harrington, “We Are HERD: Exploring Animal and Human Herding Behavior Through Research, Scenario and Performance”
7:25-7:50:
Frank Pietronigro, “The Expansion of the Arts, Humanities and Culture in Space Exploration
7:50-8:10
Break. (During the break anyone in the audience currently working within the intersections of art and science will have 30 seconds to share their work).
8:10-8:35
Robert Buelteman, “Energetic Photogrammetry: A History of Photographic Technology”
8:35-9 p.m.
Robert Edgar. “Animating the Memory Theatre”
9 to 9:30: Discussion
About the presentations:
Eve Warnock and Kate Harrington
Eve Warnock is a multimedia artist who melds ancient techniques of art-making with modern technologies. She is a costume and set designer as well as a director for live performances and films. She received her bachelor of arts degree in arts and humanities from The Ohio State University, and a master of fine arts from UC Santa Cruz's Digital Arts and New Media program. Her work explores the boundaries of human and animal relationships, dissecting primal instincts as a way to reconnect humans with each other and to the animal kingdom. Her work has been shown all over the United States in diverse venues, from the street to the museum, from the gallery to the guerrilla.
Frank Pietronigro
Frank Pietronigro, an interdisciplinary artist, will provide a general overview of some of the groups, individuals and institutions involved in expanding the presence of the arts, humanities, and culture within the context of human space exploration while emphasizing the change of acronym from STEM education to STEAM education (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Music and Mathemetics). He will discuss his role as director of the Zero Gravity Arts Consortium and his current project: Space Wishes.
Pietronigro has flown twice under reduced gravity conditions, in 1998 and 2006, when he created multiple works using the media of painting, drawing, dance including microgravity drawings while blind folded, microgravity mobiles, kinetic text and graffitti based zero-gravity video works, drift paintings and dances in reduced gravity conditions.
Robert Buelteman
Robert Buelteman says that “As the medium evolves so must the artist." He creates unique energetic photograms inspired by Japanese ink-brush paintings and improvisational jazz. This includes high-voltage electricity and hand-delivered fiber optic light.
His journey as a photographic artist began in 1973 and has continued through multiple residencies including the Djerassi Resident Artists Program, the Santa Fe Institute, and Stanford University. During that time he worked in black and white landscape photography, ran a successful commercial studio in San Francisco's south-of-Market area, and now, using high-energy electrical discharges and fiber-optically delivered light, makes what he calls “Energetic Photograms.”
His art has received accolades from institutions as diverse as the U.S. Congress, the Commonwealth Club of California, Committee for Green Foothills, and the Natural Resources Defense Council. In recent years this art has been the subject of essays in 23 languages on six continents around the globe, and can be found in public and private collections worldwide, including the Yale University Art Museum, Santa Barbara Museum of Art, Kleiner, Perkins, Caulfield & Byers, Bank of America, Adobe Systems, Stanford University, Xerox, and Nikon.
Robert Edgar
In his abstract, Robert Edgar, a senior instructional designer at Stanford University, says: "I introduce early memory theatre strategies, my own work with computers and memory theaters, and then my current work with my Simultaneous Opposites engine. The history of memory theaters provides analogs for the process of art itself. I'll show how I've worked through them to create a personal aesthetic.”
Edgar creates and employs software engines to examine mediated artifacts forged at his zone of proximal development. Robert's computer-based art engines include MERGEEMERGE (2013), Simultaneous Opposites (2008 – present), The Duchamp Examinations (2006), Memory Theatre Two (2003), Sand, or How Computers Imagine Truth in Cinema (1994), Living Cinema (1988), Memory Theatre One (1985), and Intersticies (1972). Robert holds an MFA from Syracuse University's College of Visual and Performing Arts. He grew up in Cocoa Beach, Fla., during the birth of the NASA Space Program (1958-1970).
The UC Davis Art/Science Fusion Program was founded by entomologist/artist Diane Ullman of the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology and self-described "rock artist" Donna Billick.
The Leonardo Art Science Evening Rendezvous (LASER) is a series of lectures and presentations on art, science and technology. Founded in 2008 by LASER Chair Piero Scaruffi on behalf of Leonardo/ISAST, LASERs are now presented at a number of venues: University of San Francisco, Stanford University, UC Berkeley, UCLA, UC Davis, UC Santa Cruz and a New York Studio.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Why is there a gap between computational and artistic models of movement?
How does vegetation respond to microclimate?
When science and medicine change, how does that affect us?
Those are some of the topics to be explored Monday, June 2 at the Leonardo Art Science Evening Rendezvous (LASER) event, part of the UC Davis Art/Science Fusion Program.
The event, free and open to the public, takes place from 6:30 to 9:30 p.m. in Room 3001 of the Plant and Environmental Sciences Building, UC Davis campus.
The event begins with socializing and networking from 6:30 to 7 p.m. A break is planned from 7:15 to 8:10 p.m. to allow the audience to share their work intersecting art and science (30 seconds each), said moderator/coordinator Anna Davidson, a Ph.D. candidate in the UC Davis Department of Plant Sciences and a teacher with the UC Davis Art Science Fusion Program.
The speaker schedule:
- Gene Felice, graduate student, at the University of California Santa Cruz, will speak on "Justice in a More Human World" from 7 to 7:25.
- Michael Neff, associate professor in Computer Science and Cinema and Technocultural Studies at UC Davis, will speak on "The Gap Between Computational and Artistic Models of Movement"
- Danielle Svehla Christianson of the Berkeley Center for New Media, will discuss "The Gap Between: Computational and Artistic Models of Movement, “A Digital Forest: 01100110 01101111 01110010 01100101 01110011 01110100” from 8:10 to 8:35 p.m.
- Joe Dumit, director of Science and Technology Studies and professor of anthropology at UC Davis, will speak on "Haptic Creativity: Seeing, Scaling and Storymaking with the KeckCAVES" from 8:35 to 9 p.m.
Gene Felice, a graduate student at UC Santa Cruz, is enrolled in the DANM (Digital Arts and New Media) program and is currently working with OpenLab and the Mechatonics Research Group to develop his project Oceanic Scales. He divides his research between art, design and education. He says this split allows him to develop balance between interactive art, living systems, and the latest available technology for new media. Felice maintains a hybrid practice at the intersection of nature and technology,developing symbiotically creative systems as arts/science research.
About his talk, Felice says: "We, as humans, are enmeshed in multiple and complex interactions within the more-than-human world." He and colleagues Sophia Magnone and Andy Murray, as individuals, "find problematic the ways in which these relationships are so often exploitative or taken for granted. In our independent work, we each address from a different perspective the ways in which humans and nonhumans are intertwined: Sophia inquires into the worlds of animals, cyborgs, objects, and other nonhumans in speculative fiction, tracing unexpected forms of agency, liveliness, and interaction. Gene explores the relationships between living systems and contemporary technology in an attempt to find balance and grace through interactions of art, science and education. Andy focuses on bioengineering, the creation of new complex collaborative relationships, and the effective discard of others. We have come together to merge our work around these topics and produce a shared set of provocative questions. We hope to use these questions as a jumping-off point for an event that will engage a broader community and generate awareness, reflexivity, and affinity."
The UC Davis Art Science Fusion Program was co-founded and is co-directed by two people: UC Davis entomologist/artist Diane Ullman, professor and former chair of the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology, and a former associate dean with the UC Davis College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, and self-described "rock artist Donna Billick of UC Davis.
Ullman and Billick began teaching classes in the mid-1990s that led to the formation of the Art/Science Fusion Program. The program today includes design faculty, science faculty, museum educators, professional artists and UC Davis students. “Participants see and feel art and science, hold it in their hands, hearts and memories—in ceramics, painting, photographs, music, and textiles,” Ullman said.
The program, developed initially in the Department of Entomology and Nematology, is "an innovative teaching program that crosses college boundaries and uses experiental learning to enhance scientific literary for students from all disciplines," Ullman said. The program promotes environmental literacy with three undergraduate courses, a robust community outreach program, and sponsorship of the Leonardo Art Science Evening Rendezvous (LASERs).
For more information:
- UC Davis Art/Science Fusion Program
- Leonardo Art Science Evening Rendezvous (LASER)
- Upcoming Programs, LASER
- Plant and Environmental Sciences Building (map)
Contact information: Anna Davidson, adavidson@ucdavis.edu.