A new art installation at UGA explores the intersection of engineering and art

“We want to be a college where by we see engineering as the intersection of a ton of different disciplines and that is been a target of what we have attempted to do at the Faculty of Engineering given that it began 10 decades back,” suggests Dr. Donald Leo, Dean of the School of Engineering at UGA.

At initial look, this could possibly appear a entire world away from the visible arts. Engineering is exact, art is inspiring. But glimpse further and you will locate these two disciplines have a large amount in common. Equally involve extreme review and determination to create points that final a lifetime.

Dean Leo fulfilled with me in Driftmier Engineering Centre in which college students bustle about likely to classes and functioning collaboratively in prevalent spaces afforded by the ongoing renovations in the creating.

It is this spirit of collaboration that encouraged a physical representation of the intersection of Engineering and Artwork. Mike Wooten, the Director of Communications at the Higher education of Engineering, claims that Athens-place artists Jan Perkins was commissioned to produce combined media panels “for the Higher education of Engineering to illustrate the various varieties of analysis and pupil understanding assignments that are happening in the college or university.”

Artist Jan Perkins was to begin with motivated by the opening of stage 1 renovations in the building, which has been current in an industrial model that includes glass review pods, metal, and stone.

Perkins describes the impressive procedure she applied to make the operate. “Technically, the procedure demands…when you do the job on the pc, paint on the laptop or computer, and layer imagery on the computer system, it demands a transfer of imagery from the personal computer onto some sort of media. But for this job, I developed a transfer printing method onto fine raw silk. And this extremely-high-quality silk is ultimately printed on and then adhered in panels, or strips, if you will, to the artwork panel. And it is utilized as a template information because it’s extremely-sheer. And from there, at the time it is adhered completely to a gessoed area, from there, the oil paint and cold wax, which was my medium of alternative on this project, is used in several levels.”

The 9 panel long-lasting assortment hangs in the centre hallway on the first floor of Driftmier Engineering Centre in the bustling hub of scholar action. While I toured the region with Dean Leo, he said, “You can observe every single of the panels signifies a unique element of our college that, truthfully, Jan just acquired thrilled about…it truly is nice to see that all of the panels have a particular tale, but then, in addition, there’s an intentionality between all 9 of them that represents all the various features of our college or university.”

Artist Jan Perkins claims she just feels honored to be section of the task. “As hard as this covid time period of two many years has been for absolutely everyone, this was a magnificent challenge for me to have during the time of covid…it saved me incredibly engaged and for that I’m truly grateful.”