Extra Credit Event 2: The Hammer Museum

The last event that I went to was the Hammer Museum. The Hammer Museum is located in Westwood and is actually affiliated with UCLA. I'd been there previously, but never realized how relevant the museum was to our course.

The first thing I saw when I went to the hammer museum was a series of exhibits that feature large pipes displayed in a way that we do not usually see them. The pipe is is an artistic spin on an every day object. Pipes are used to carry cables, wires, and electricity everywhere. These pipes are infrastructure, something that all technology relies on. Oscar's display of pipes, in a unique way, is an artistic representation of a necessary infrastructure technology. This is a combination of art and technology, as an everyday item that is used for technology is manipulated to represent art. The pipes are placed in a way that we normally do not see them, making it a very unique sculpture. One pipe is combined with a tree trunk to create a fountain, a scientific and technological innovation to create a piece of art. Oscar's work is a representation of the third culture discussed by C.P. Snow, as art, technology, and science are being used together to create something interesting and unique (Snow 1959).

 The Pipe by Oscar Tuazon 

Vena Contracta (back) and Pipe Prototype (front) by Oscar Tuazon

Natural Man by Oscar Tuazon (it's a fountain!)

I had the privilege of being able to see the Black Mountain College exhibit at the Hammer Museum. At the exhibit, I saw a loom, a technological innovation, that was being displayed as an artwork. This loom was used in the past to create beautiful textiles. I thought it was really interesting how a technological innovation that was once used to create artistic works was now being displayed as art. This shows the constant overlap between technology and art, a topic that we discussed the first week of lecture and beyond (Vesna 2012).

The Loom at the Black Mountain College exhibit

Lastly, Christopher William's Cutaway model Switar 25 mm fl. 4 AR Glass, wood, and brass photograph is a great representation of an artwork that embodies technology. The photograph displays the inner workings of a Nikon camera. It shows all the technological parts. This photograph requires a technological understanding of a camera in order to cut it in a way that displays the inside of a camera well. The creation of this photograph requires a collaboration of art and science.

Cutaway model Switar 25 mm fl. 4 AR Glass, wood, and brass by Christopher William

Overall, throughout the Hammer Museum, I saw lots of artworks that were representative of the third culture that C.P. Snow discusses, the combination of art and science (Snow 1959). As the quarter comes to an end, I am glad that I was able to experience so many events, including this one, that helped show me how prevalent the third culture is in our world.

Proof that I was at The Hammer Museum

Me in front of the Leap Before You Look: Black Mountain College exhibit

Event Link: https://hammer.ucla.edu/

Citations:

Snow, C. P. The Two Cultures and the Scientific Revolution. New York: Cambridge UP, 1959. Print.

Vesna, Victoria. “Two Cultures.” Cole UC online. Youtube, 30 March 2012. Web. 05 June 2016.