Eszter

I love public art. I love stumbling upon sculptures while walking around in a city. I only got to spend about 36 hours in Turku, Finland and most of it was rather dark (and/or foggy) plus I was inside for my talk and meals for a good chunk of the time, but I still got to experience some surprises. Pictured to the right is Posankka, a cross between a pig and a duck, that its artist Alvar Gullichsen apparently created as a commentary on genetically-modified organisms. I spotted it across the highway as I was walking around the University of Turku and had to get closer to investigate. It looked cute from afar, not so much from closer. It seems to elicit a lot of sentiments in people and now greets visitors to Turku as they enter the city. (Originally it floated on water.)

This was not the creepiest piece I saw in Turku, not to suggest that I usually measure sculptures by the amount of creepiness they elicit. That just happened to come up here a couple of times. The little girl to the left wins that award from me. It reminds me of something, but I can’t put my finger on it and online searches didn’t help. I’m more of a fan of other pieces I saw around town. But not being a fan does not mean I don’t enjoy stumbling upon a piece. As I noted, I get a kick out of being surprised by such works when I explore a city. What’s some of the more unusual public art you’ve seen? I’d love to see examples if you can point to them.

For more on what public art I found walking the streets of Turku, click here.

This isn’t the first exhibit dedicated to René Magritte and it won’t be the last (one just ended a few days ago in San Francisco), but it’s the one I got to see yesterday while attending a conference in Lugano, Switzerland, and thus inspires this weekend’s art post. I have already been to the Magritte Museum in Brussels, but nonetheless had plenty of works to see here that I had not encountered before. The pieces are presented in chronological order grouped by style. One thing I really like in such exhibits is when the work of those who inspired the artist is on display as well. A piece by de Chirico right next to Magritte’s paintings makes his influence on the artist very clear.

Magritte may be most known for his Surrealist pieces, but he created art in lots of other styles. For example, he had an Impressionistic phase, although apparently due to a lack of positive response, he abandoned it fairly quickly. He also did quite a bit of work designing advertisements.

This exhibit features several of his curtains pieces, including a large bronze sculpture:

The MASI Lugano has a beautiful view of Lake Lugano and the surrounding mountains, which is a gorgeous backdrop for the sculpture. See more of the pieces on display at this exhibit in my photo album.

The exhibit runs through January 9, 2019 and is a pleasant 15 min downhill walk from the Lugano train station. Lugano is just over an hour from Milan and just over two hours from Zurich by train.

I have no doubt that you have seen better pictures of rainbows and probably even double rainbows. What’s noteworthy about this photo is that Death Valley gets about 60mm (less than two inches) of precipitation a year. Compare that to the annual average of Los Angeles at 380mm (15 inches) or Phoenix at 200mm (8 inches). Perhaps you see where I’m going with this. The chances of a double rainbow in this part of the world are extremely small so while my first reaction was: “Why does it have to rain precisely when I’m here?” this approach soon shifted to “Wow, what a beautifully rare occasion.” Most of my other photos convey what you’re more likely to expect from the area, you can see some of them here.

I went there for the open market, I stayed for the open art studios. It was a warm Fall Sunday and I was excited to check out the street fair at SoWa Open Market to look at local artists’ creative goods. That experience was fine, but, perhaps due to my rather high standards thanks to the numerous excellent street fairs in summer Chicagoland, it did not inspire me too much. This may have been partly due to the fact that such art fairs tend to showcase designs of the geographical locality so my having no emotional connection to Boston left me rather detached. Or I am reading too much into it and the works were just not that exciting.

What really got me engaged instead were the dozens of art studios open to visitors to browse. I looked at all sorts of paintings and photography, but my favorite was Brian Murphy‘s wire art, an example of which illustrates this post. Not only did I like the shapes of the wire sculptures that in many cases were quite expressive, but the artist infuses humor into many of his works through their captions. I spent quite some time browsing his various pieces, some surprising in their simplicity, others impressive in their complexity. Next time you are in the Boston area, I recommend checking out these studios if they happen to be open when you are there. It’s conveniently accessible with public transportation.

The sign of the piece pictured here reads:
Brian Murphy, While Alice Was Ready To Admit He Was A Rather Amazing Egg She Feared The Mess He Would Make When He Inevitably Fell, Wire Sculpture, $200

Research that is most relevant to my scholarship tends to get published in journals and I have ways of keeping up with such work. I have a much harder time fitting in reading academic books. They don’t tend to be directly related to my research so there is rarely any urgency in reading them as they are unlikely to inform my work directly (although, of course, could easily inform my work in more indirect ways). Lots of books get published on the social aspects of digital media that may not need to be cited in my own writing, but I am nonetheless curious to read simply because they are of interest to me more generally. I’d like to know how others fit in such book-reading. Are there specific regular time slots you set aside for this? If yes, how often? Has your approach worked?

I started a book club as part of the Digital Society Initiative at my university as a way to get myself to read at least a few books a year. This way I set aside several hours leading up to the book club meeting, but I don’t think it’s realistic to do that every week. Or is that what I should be doing? We read 4-5 books a year so 4-5 such slots on my annual calendar is not a problem. But this is way less than the structured time I’d like to spend on book reading. Please share your experiences even if they concern failed attempts, I’m curious to hear.

Commutes are one possibility, but my train ride to work is just 20 minutes, which is not enough to make that much of a dent. (I’m not complaining about my commute time, just recognizing that it’s not a ton of time for meaningful reading.) Evening hours I reserve for other types of reading or other activities (like making art).

As for the physical environment needed to read comfortably, I am all set there. I bought a very comfy chaise longue (IKEA’s Grönlid) for my office and it’s done wonders for making my way through readings of all sorts such as grant applications I am reviewing. But so yeah, with so many demands on our reading time (articles closely tied to research, student papers, colleagues’ work I’m commenting on, refereeing), how do I fit in more structured time for book reading?

Last year, I asked you to help support science. This year, I am asking you to pitch in to help end the corruption of U.S. democracy through a donation to Equal Citizens. Equal Citizens is pursuing several important projects such as fixing the Electoral College, ending SuperPACs, and ending voter suppression. There is tons of information concerning the specifics of how they are doing this on equalcitizens.us.

Equal Citizens does not bombard one’s mailbox with constant requests for donations like some other organizations. Indeed, they haven’t done this kind of a campaign in a year. To help support them, I am hosting a fundraiser through Facebook where I have committed to matching up to $500 of donations. Won’t you add your support as well? You can do so through my Facebook fundraising page or directly through the Equal Citizens site. Thank you!

Today’s art post inspiration comes from an unlikely source: JAMA Opthamalogy. The article “Evidence That Leonardo da Vinci Had Strabismus” makes the case that the artist’s exceptional rendering of 3-D in 2-D was in part thanks to his eye condition sometimes referred to as wandering eye. The author, opthomologist Christopher Tyler of City, University of London, examined six pieces thought to be depicting Leonardo da Vinci: “David (Andrea del Verrocchio); Young Warrior (Andrea del Verrocchio); Salvator Mundi (da Vinci); Young John the Baptist (da Vinci); Vitruvian Man (da Vinci) and another possible da Vinci self-portrait.” (quoted from the university’s press release). Ars Technica’s coverage of the piece has helpful visuals. There seems to be disagreement in the art community about whether all of those art pieces depict Leonardo da Vinci, but this is a topic Tyler had already researched earlier. His argument seems convincing to me and is an interesting revelation about the condition under which some artists did that work. Apparently other famous artists also had strabismus (e.g., Rembrandt) or other vision impairments (e.g., Monet, O’Keeffe). I appreciate the angle the Washington Post’s coverage takes on this at the end noting that this should give people with eye-alignment disorders some boost in confidence to counter the discrimination they sometimes face both on the job market and in social situations.

One fun aspect of public art is that you can stumble into it without any planning on your part to have an artistic experience. Such was the case when I found myself staring at columns of colanders and looking up at fruits and vegetables hanging from pots and pans in City Hall Park in New York. The exhibition is by B. Wurtz who likes to draw on everyday objects in his work. Since I am a huge fan of reusing objects, this appeals to me a great deal.

Another neat aspect of public art in such a location is that by taking a step, you can get an entirely different visual experience. With both trees and scyscrapers in the background, this is not an exaggeration. The pictures on the exhibition site were taken in daylight while mine (see album on Flickr) were taking during dusk so they offer different views from that perspective as well. The trees will be on display in this park through December 7, 2018.

In a small town in the French-speaking part of Switzerland is a fantastic exhibit dedicated entirely to Star Wars. It showcases several artists using very different media to pay homage to the popular series. From digitally-edited photographs of classical sculptures to various creative 3D-renderings of well-known characters, from photos of lego scenes to drawings in countless styles, the exhibit offers lots of interesting visual stimuli. It’s hard to pick a favorite. I very much appreciated Kyle Hagey’s pieces and can’t believe I had never come across them before. Conveniently, you can view and buy copies of his work on Etsy. There is also a free-to-play Star Wars pinball machine on the top floor of the museum as well as an old-school video game. This is a must-see for any Star Wars fan. The show runs through Oct 14th. That doesn’t leave a lot of time to visit and as far as I can tell, sadly it is not a traveling exhibition. While not the same experience, I did upload some of my photos here for those who are interested, but can’t make it there in person.

For any public art lover or sculpture lover, the Sculpture Milwaukee exhibit will be a thrill. Along the city’s Wisconsin Avenue, the event showcases over 20 pieces. There are additional sculptures along the way to enjoy that are not part of the exhibition per se. The styles differ considerably and many are good conversation starters. It’s worth visiting in person, but if you can’t, you can see the pieces here, captured during my August visit. The exhibition runs through Oct 21st.

Are you participating in a March For Our Lives event this coming Saturday, March 24th? There are hundreds of events taking place across the world. And now you don’t even have to worry about what sign to carry. Members of Action Together Zurich have created March For Our Lives posters, 89 of them (plus two to carry up front for some context). Each one is unique, with the front listing a common-sense gun bill that Congress has failed to act on, and the back listing the names of gun violence victims. The idea is for folks to print out the posters for marchers to carry at their local March For Our Lives event. Please spread the word. Bit.ly/mfolposters is the link to share.

As of this past week, I’ve posted over 500 photos in my “a sky photo a day” project. I love taking a moment each day to look up and see what patterns, or lack thereof, surround my area.

This was the January 22, 2017 shot. I was at the Getty in Los Angeles when this curious cloud formation appeared. I have more photos of the neighboring sky on Flickr if you’d like to explore. Does anyone have any idea what would result in this? I was so intrigued.

Last week, I shared a bit about what my work day looks like. Want to come be a colleague? My department, the Institute for Mass Communication and Media Research at the University of Zurich, has two open positions. Applications are due soon, rather out-of-sync with the usual US job market time line for this field, so I’m trying to spread the word. If you know of academics for whom these positions may be of interest, please share the info with them. One is a tenure-track assistant professor position in political communication, the other is an open-rank position in media politics/media policy. Knowledge of German is not required although an openness to learn it is. I teach all of my classes in English. Starting my fourth year I may be asked to do some of my teaching in German. It’s a great work environment and it’s a wonderful city!

I’m nine hours into posting for science-a-thon and someone (thanks, DT!) finally asked me to clarify what the fundraising is for. I didn’t realize that accessing Tracey Holloway’s description of Science-a-thon — which is what I used for explanation — requires a LinkedIn login so I’ll copy her note here:

From Tracey Holloway:

Hi All –

You’ve probably heard about the study that over 80% of American’s can’t accurately name a living scientist — and my guess is that the numbers are similar when asking “what do scientists actually do?” Of course, we do lots of things – work in labs, go out in the field, teach classes, program computers – but the public doesn’t get to see this.

As a large-scale public outreach initiative, and the first major fundraiser for the Earth Science Women’s Network (ESWN), we’re launching Science-A-Thon. … an international “day of science” where participants share 12 photos over 12 hours of their day. From morning coffee through the ups and downs of a day in the life of a scientists (any scientist, any field of STEM, students, professionals – all are welcome).

We already have 100 scientists signed on – lots of earth scientists of course, but also cancer biologists, computer scientists, and more. Men and women, from 10 different countries so far. We’d love to have you! Just go to scienceathon.org/how to sign up. (And you’ll get a great “I love science” t-shirt)

If you’re not up for showcasing your own day, you can support ESWN and Science-A-Thon by sponsoring your favorite scientists (like me!)

Even if you’re not interested in donating to the cause, I highly recommend checking out the #scienceathon hashtag on Twitter as it’s a great way to get a sense of what a scientist’s day looks like. You can see my own Twitter photos here or on Facebook if that’s your preference. Or simply as updates to my earlier CT post today. Actually, I’ll make it easy and am copying the material to the bottom of this post.

Thanks to those who have contributed, I much appreciate it! Perhaps now that the goal is clearer, others will join in. You can donate here, any amount appreciated.

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