Inflatable planetarium dome, 4K projection system, 4-channel surround sound audio system.

Spring 2019 Course: Curating Stories and Science in Northern Arizona (taught by Daniel Collins)

In the seminar Curating Stories and Science in Northern Arizona, students worked individually and collectively to create a “research compendium” inspired by James Turrell’s Roden Crater. Marked by the intersection of science and art, our discussions included experts from astrophysics, literature, sacred architecture, natural history, cultural geography, Native American studies, perceptual psychology, phenomenology, archaeology, and fine art.  Students generated a rich collection of works representing many disciplines and methodological approaches.  Roden Crater has become a launching pad for our own embodied experience of place—from the microscopic features of the Arizona landscape to interstellar space.

Glass jars with natural specimens, handmade book (cyanotypes, watercolor paint, paper, colored pencil, vellum, linen thread), single layer screen prints with etched acrylic, postcards of three-dimensional imagery, narrated story and site-specific field recordings on cassette, cassette case with printed image, cassette player, Quartz crystal radio antenna, labels made of watercolor paper, red-blue glasses, handmade sleeves and boxes.

Spring 2019 Course: Approaches, to Light (Taught by Edward Finn)

Approaches to Light traced the fundamental questions of James Turrell’s work to their origins in philosophy, literature, physics, and art. By engaging with light as a medium for human imagination, we explored the ways in which we make meaning from the physical universe and the aesthetic frames we impose on it. Students created their own artistic expressions of light, landscape, and imagination in the form of physical artifacts, audiovisual experiences, and other vessels of meaning that responded to the work of Turrell and Roden Crater.