erikjensenDESMA9

            I had the privilege of attending Gerald De Jong’s showcase of his tensegrity art on April 7th. De Jong’s structures beautifully showcased week two’s theme of the relationship between art and math. De Jong’s background is not in art at all, but in computer science. He drew inspiration from others in this field like Kenneth Snelson [3]. His computational background is perhaps what enables him to make the complex systems that compose the framework of his art form [1].       The essence of tensegrity structures is the tension of pulls and pushes within the system as a whole [5]. De Jong displayed how using a network of cables combined with floating struts and joints, he was able to construct large, standing structures that seem to defy the integrity of the materials. For his especially large structures, it is imperative for him to plan and design them virtually rather than by hand. [4] With his background in computer scien...

This week, we focus on the connection that medicine and medical technology has with our bodies and art. A very clear example of this is the phenomenon of plastic surgery. This cosmetic surgery seeks to mold the body in various ways. Like most of the medical advances we will discuss, this procedure is a product of war. In World War 1, plastic surgery was done to change the features of wounded soldiers in an attempt to restore their appearance [5]. Since then plastic surgery has become very popular around the world, and through surgery, people are defining new kinds of beauty and art. For instance, an artist named ORLAN has gone through many transformations through the years in the name of art [2]. Her pieces reveal many underlying feelings toward how we as a society view such procedures. [6]  Unusual medical procedures have been the subject of many artistic pieces over the years; like in the 1972 film “A Clockwork Orange”. After being arrested for his “ultraviolence”, the main chara...

  The subject of this week’s material focuses on the relationship between robotics and art. Originally robots were just a fictional product of art from an era of increasing industrialization. As this industrialization has evolved, robots have become a part of daily life in our society; albeit not so many humanoid ones such as those depicted in movies like Metropolis.         That said there has become an increasing demand for more human-like robots, as mentioned by Professor Machiko Kusahara. In part of her lecture from this week's resources, she mentions how humanoid or even animal-like robots are beneficial for numerous tasks, including rescue missions; as to be friendly to those who are being saved by these machines [2]. Another example of humanoid robots interacting with people was from Electric Circus’s “Dirk, The Homeless Robot” [3]. This remote controlled, life-like robot pushing a shopping cart received mixed reactions like joy and confusion from the cro...

This week we are investigating the intersection between math and art. There appears to be an indivisible connection between math and art; some attributes more subtle than others. One way in which mathematics is clearly at play is in the way artists enable perspective in a piece. A two-dimensional canvas is brought to life using clever geometry to create an illusion of depth [4].   Another clear interplay of math and art I witnessed this week was Gerald De Jong’s demonstration of tensegrity structures. He has constructed these sturdy, complex, and beautiful systems in tandem with a self-made computer program. When answering questions about his work, he mentioned how he would learn methods to design the program by working on the structures with his hands, and vice versa [3]. Another fascinating example from this week’s material involved fractals; which are derived from mathematical formulas [1]. In computer generated representations of The Mandelbrot Set, the infinitely differing co...