Linda Weintraub Workshops
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| Me attending Jiayi Young's workshop |
I personally really enjoyed all the workshops, and getting to better understand the constant collaboration between art and science. I would definitely recommend attending this event because in these workshops we really can see the connection between the "two cultures." But Linda Weintraub also pushes artists to think bigger than just science. Linda Weintraub brings about this idea of “eco-materialism,” which in essence is a message to artists, and really people in general, to interact with their environment.
The perfect example of "eco-tistical" thinking is Terence Koh’s interpretation of the honeybee. He spoke of the beach apple, and how sometimes he notices people crying as they exit the “gates of eternal peace,” as he puts it. For context, a beach apple is essentially an enormous beehive that is usually around six feet tall and is lined with honey and beeswax. The honey and beeswax act as a coating, forming a mesh that keeps humans and honeybees protected from each other, yet they remain very close. The vibrations that the bees give off, resonate with humans at superior levels, allowing us to recognize the love that exists in our lives. Humans have this ingrained ability to communicate using these vibrations, but we are not as perfectly in tuned with our environment like the honeybees are, making it impossible for us to do so at this point in time. Recognizing that there is a higher level that we can tap into is our first step in reaching true peacefulness.
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| Bees are so connected with their environment that they can communicate at different frequencies |
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| A visual representation of our phones literal attachment to ourselves |
Moving towards achieving this mindset is ridding ourselves of unnecessary distractions, which is the main point of Vera Wittkowsky’s discussion regarding our cell phones. Our phones have become part of us, and for me I consider my phone to be a close friend, someone who is always there. Sometimes I cannot fall asleep unless if I am passively listening to something on my phone. A study conducted by CNN shows that the same sort of sleep apnea that I suffer from, presumably because I have become so dependent on my phone to fall asleep, occurs in more than 35% of Americans. It keeps us from reaching higher levels and interacting with our environment.
Iain Kerr helped us interact with our environment by literally absorbing it as we drank the water surrounding the stinging nettle plants. Stinging nettle plants, while they may seem like a nuisance, have many practical uses, such as in medicine or for cooking. Iain Kerr calls eating a "central motive engagement", and while most of us eat passively, eating is really an event. It is us humans consuming our environment. In this way we are embarking upon this realm of “neo-materialism.”
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| CO2 tubes being built into a cube |
Neo-materialism is a new way of thinking about our relationship to the environment. Jiayi Young provides the work of a visual representation of the carbon dioxide we emit as an example that represents this new idea. Humans emit carbon dioxide, so much so that they contribute to 27% of the annual CO2 released into our atmosphere per year, according to the Scientific American magazine. To represent this she had her participants blow into plastic tubes that we later attempted to assemble into a cube. The lesson of the exercise is not just in calibration, but also that we can affect our environment with both our physical presence and other intangibles, like our carbon dioxide emission. This is the world of neo-materialism.
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| The human CO2 cycle |
Sources
National Geographic. The Plight of the Honeybee. Photograph. 2013. https://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2013/13/130510-honeybee-bee-science-european-union-pesticides-colony-collapse-epa-science/
Unknown. Slave to Your Phone. Photograph. 2016. https://www.pinterest.com/pin/697706167241197744/
Unknown. Human CO2 Cycle. Photograph. 2011. https://www.ck12.org/book/Human-Biology-Breathing/section/4.1/
Herzberg, Dov. “Are Volcanoes or Humans Harder on the Atmosphere?” Scientific American, www.scientificamerican.com/article/earthtalks-volcanoes-or-humans/.
Scutti, Susan. “Your Smartphone May Be Hurting Your Sleep.” CNN, Cable News Network, 23 June 2017, www.cnn.com/2016/11/09/health/smartphones-harm-sleep/index.html.
Snow, C. P. The Two Cultures and the Scientific Revolution. New York, New York, Cambridge University Press, 1959. Print
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