The Design Revolution Road Show was here! Featuring a biodiesel-powered truck and super-cool Airstream trailer filled with tangible examples of humanitarian industrial design, the show came to Hillside Campus on Monday. Check out their first-hand account of the visit, and view a video of the foot-powered WEZA pedal-treadle pump generator that powers the trailer, on the Design Revolution Road Show website. What an interesting day—thanks for the visit!
Monthly Archives: February 2010
Wayne White Stops By
Illustrator and artist Wayne White was on campus yesterday to speak to Art Center students in the Ahmanson Theater. He spoke about his journey from Pee Wee’s Playhouse (where his set and puppet designs won three Emmy Awards) to art direction for music videos (Big Time and Tonight, Tonight) to a seminal painting career of works witty, wordy and various. A book signing followed the talk.
There’s an interesting writeup of White’s recent exhibit at Houston’s Rice University Gallery at glasstire.com.
(Pictured: Pretend You’re Someplace Else, Wayne White, 2008)
Williamson Gallery Exhibition Piece Shown at Winter Olympics
A digital installation artwork commissioned by Art Center’s Williamson Gallery for the 2008-09 exhibition OBSERVE is part of the Vancouver 2010 Cultural Olympiad Festival. George Legrady’s We Are Stardust is one of more than 40 digital art installations in CODE Live, an 18-day event featuring visual art, music and performance fueled by digital technology and audience involvement. CODE Live, which began February 4, continues through February 21.
We Are Stardust was created by Legrady for OBSERVE, an exhibition organized by the Williamson Gallery in collaboration with the NASA/JPL Spitzer Science Center.
Colors Test Shows CEOs are Different
What is your favorite color? If you’re a CEO, your answer will probably be different than most. Results from a 60-second online test are being used to steer people toward a career that matches their personality and strengths.
USA Today reports: “[Psychiatry professor Rense] Lange says no one knows why so much can be learned about a person by the colors they choose. Those answers are buried deep in neuroscience, he says, but it’s just a matter of time before marketers will be able to target products to consumers based on color preferences.”
Read more at USA Today, and take the test. What is your vocational calling?
Design Revolution Road Show Rolls Onto Campus Monday
Monday promises to be quite an exciting day at Hillside Campus, thanks to the Design Revolution Road Show. The traveling exhibition, book tour, lecture and workshop series is bringing “product design that empowers” to more than 30 design universities and high schools across the nation. A Project H Design initiative, the road show features a biodiesel-powered truck and Airstream trailer filled with tangible examples of humanitarian industrial design solutions (also showcased in the book Design Revolution: 100 Products that Empower People).The all-day exhibition, presented at Art Center in collaboration with Designmatters, Alumni Relations and GOOD, will feature a lecture by Emily Pilloton, founder and executive director of Project H Design. The airstream trailer will be parked in front of the main entrance at Hillside Campus, open for viewing from noon until 10 pm. An evening reception will be held starting at 6 pm. You don’t want to miss this!
Design Revolution Road Show
Monday, February 8
Art Center’s Hillside Campus
Open exhibition times: Noon-10 pm
Evening reception: 6-10 pm
Thinking Outside the Dot
When he first arrived on campus in October 2009, Dr. Lorne M. Buchman said one of his first tasks as Art Center’s new president and chief executive officer would be to listen to students, faculty and staff to hear their thoughts on a future direction for the College.
“We must first come together as a community to envision our opportunities, to imagine new possibilities, and to enter into a bold, habit-breaking conversation about our educational future,” wrote Buchman in December when he announced a comprehensive planning process for the College.
To get the conversation rolling, Buchman invited the entire community to attend two back-to-back events: an evening kick-off panel discussion in the Ahmanson Auditorium featuring provocative national thought leaders (for a recap, see yesterday’s post); and a brainstorming session the following day to tackle key issues derived from Art Center’s mission statement.
On January 14, approximately 300 members of the Art Center community—faculty, staff, students and alumni—gathered in the Student Dining Room for the daylong brainstorm. “I want to encourage you all to imagine without limit,” urged Buchman to the larger-than-expected group. “Imagine without limit what Art Center has always been, or what an art and design college ‘ought to be’.”
The 2010-11 FAFSA Tutorial Is Here!
Students and financial aid staff at University of California, Santa Barbara have created the cool Seven Easy Steps to the FAFSA: A Student’s Guide to the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, an online tutorial to help students complete the 2010-11 Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA). The tutorial is a research project that will look at the overall effectiveness of multimedia tools on the admissions and financial aid application processes at various education institutions. Check it out!
Rethinking Art Center’s Future: Guest Panelists Weigh In
This past January not only marked the start of a new year and decade, but the beginning of a new visioning process for the College as well. Two back-to-back events—an evening panel discussion featuring national thought leaders, and a daylong brainstorming session tackling key issues relating to Art Center’s mission statement—were open to the Art Center community.
On January 13, faculty, staff, students, alumni, trustees and friends packed the Ahmanson Auditorium for the visioning kickoff. The evening session—Twittered and webcast live—featured a distinguished panel of speakers: Andrew Blauvelt, design director and curator at the Walker Art Center; Katherine Hayles, professor and director of graduate studies in literature at Duke University; Steven Oliver, board member of the grant-making organization United States Artists; and David Rice, chairman and founder of The Organization of Black Designers.
Before introducing the panelists, Art Center President Lorne Buchman stressed the imperative of higher education to value driven learning and thinking. “The capacity of our students and graduates to affect change is enormous,” he said. “We need to be educating responsible citizens—the question is how to do that.”
20000 Leagues Under the Sea Via Underwater Plane
Another childhood dream of ours is about to become a reality: Virgin has unveiled an underwater plane that will fly into the depths of the Caribbean Sea.
Guests on Necker Island, a retreat in the British Virgin Islands, will be able to dive underwater in a submarine dubbed the Necker Nymph for $25,000 a week.
CNNMoney.com writes: “Beginning on Feb. 20, two riders and a pilot will be able to take the plunge from land, or from a boat. The underwater plane uses the downward pressure on its wings to fly through the water for up to two hours at a time, while an open cockpit will give riders a 360-degree view.”
Read more, and check out a video, at CNNMoney.com.
Fighting Obesity with Design
A group of New York City government agencies have teamed with the AIA to create the Active Design Guidelines, a downloadable publication intended for designers, architects and city planners to help promote more physical activity among the citizenry in new and rehabbing building projects. The guidelines provide architects and urban designers with strategies for creating healthier buildings, streets and urban spaces, based on the latest academic research and best practices in the field.
Interesting idea. Read more at Mediabistro’s Unbeige blog.