2014 FRFAF Showcase

4:30pm Friday, April 18, 2014: The STUDIO for Creative Inquiry hosts the first annual showcase of projects supported by the Frank-Ratchye Fund for Art @ the Frontier (FRFAF), featuring speed presentations by FRFAF grantees. Presentations begin at 5:00pm in the STUDIO main space, CFA 111. Free and open to the public. Refreshments will be provided.

PRESENTERS:

MADELINE GANNON: REVERBERATING ACROSS THE DIVIDE
Reverberating Across the Divide uses 3D scanning, 3D modeling, and 3D printing in a custom modeling interface to enable a designer to craft intricate digital geometries around pre-existing physical contexts.

ANDY BIAR & ANDREW BUENO: PEEK
Peek is a system for “augmented reality graffiti,” in which an application for mobile devices allows a user to view virtual performers situated into real physical spaces. The application turns the city into “a treasure trove of unexpected easter eggs.”

SUZIE SILVER: TOADSTOOLS AND DRAGONFLIES
Toadstools and Dragonflies is a web-based fairy tale series for queer-friendly families starring luminaries from the LGBTQ community.

ROBB GODSHAW: THE BUBBLE / LUNAR PERSISTENCE APPARATUS
Created by Max Hawkins and Robb Godshaw, The Bubble is a 33-foot-tall inflatable dome which was temporarily installed on the CMU campus in the winter of 2012. The Bubble offered students an immersive reprieve from the stresses of collegiate life. Robb Godshaw’s solo project, Lunar Persistence Apparatus, uses a telescopic projector and robotic gimbal to project a lunar facsimile toward the moon.

RICH PELL: CATALOG OF POST NATURAL ORGANISMS
Rich Pell, founder of the Center for PostNatural History, has collaborated with engineer Jamie Schulte to develop a searchable relational database of living organisms that have been altered by humans through selective breeding or genetic engineering.

PATT VIRASATHIENPORNKUL: THROUGH THE LENS
Through the Lens is a hybrid instrument that involves a piece of paper, a pen, and an OLED transparent display.

MICHELLE MA: REVOLVING GAMES
Revolving Games is a location-based game and public intervention that displays a revolving door’s “high score” in revolutions-per-minute, altering the behavior of passersby in sometimes dramatic ways.

JOSHUA LOPEZ-BINDER: SCULPTURAL BIOMIMETIC HEAT SINKS
For this project, Lopez-Binder developed a computational model to create branching structures similar to stony corals. Biomimetic heat sinks could potentially eliminate the need for cooling fans by providing much more effective passive cooling.

CARL BAJANDAS: SOFT POWER
Soft Power is a 1:1 scale reproduction of a MQ-9 Reaper attack drone, constructed of muslin fabric and Polyfill. This project explores the growing international popularity of drone warfare and our comfortable relationship to these deadly technologies as citizens.

OREEN COHEN: BETWEEN A STONE AND A SHRINE
Between a Stone and a Shrine is a cinematic event of a gilded casket airlifted over Pittsburgh then led in a processional to an abandoned lot to preserve cultural identity.

JOHN OZBAY: CONVERSUS VITRA
Conversus Vitra is a continuous pitch Hydrocrystalophone made from wine glasses, motors, a midi keyboard, and DC pumps. The project uses a PID (proportional-integral-derivative) controller to control the pitch of the wine glasses, and as the player touches the midi keys, the pitch is changed as water is pumped into or sucked from individual glasses.

JOSH BARD: ROBOTIC GESTURES
Robotic Gestures investigates the subtleties of robotic gesture and its potential for communicative, emotive, and functional robotic control.

DAN WILCOX: ONWARD TO MARS
Onward to Mars is a live, audio/visual astronautical rock opera that takes you on a journey to discover the music of the Red Planet. The project was part of the Community Supported Arts (CSA) Performance Series at New Hazlett Theater.