Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

Greetings all,

I might have just about the coolest summer job ever. And your team could become involved. Please read this post to find out how you can .

(just keep on truckin' - I know my posts are sometimes exhausting but there are PICTURES in this one, if that helps at all. :D )

For the past few weeks, I have been working for a local artist named Ellen Griesedieck. She is the wife of renowned race car driver Sam Posey (who is also a sports commentator...he commented on last year's Tour de France). Ellen's latest project is a work of art called the "Wall of America", part of the American Mural Project, which is a VERY large (the finished mural will be 48 feet high and 120 feet long) multimedia collage which is intended to represent a cross section of the American workforce.

The American Mural Project

This is a study of the Mural - keep in mind that the real thing will be 120 feet long and 48 feet high!

CLICK FOR IMAGE

Ellen wants to include a tribute to science and technology professionals around the country. She intends to do this by dedicating a portion of the mural to the Mars Exploration Rover Mission, which was launched in 2003.

I have been hired by Ellen to coordinate this project. Ellen wanted to get kids from all across the country to create robotics related artwork to be included in the Mural as a tribute to all of the scientists, engineers, and technicians who made the Mars Exploration Rover mission successful.

I am going to be contacting these people and matching them with a nearby school district. The scientist/engineer will speak to a group of students at that school, describing to them what their role was in making the mission to Mars successful. Then, the kids will create a work of art which represents those aspects of the mission.

For example, if the person was responsible for designing an instrument which analyzed the composition of Martian rocks, the kids could paint a landscape of the martian surface. Or, if the person was resposible for designing the robot's CPU, they could draw a circuitboard or the lovely patterns found in IC chips (personally, I think many computer parts are very visually appealing and beautiful!).

After we recieve all of the works of art, they will be scanned and transferred on to an abstract sculpture made out of various "space-age-y" materials (such as copper and, hopefully, some actual "space junk" left over from the facilities that manufactured the rovers). The actual sculpture has not been constructed yet, but the study for it has. This is the study for the sculpture:

CLICK FOR IMAGE

CLICK FOR IMAGE

I thought that it would be wonderful if I could contact the FIRST Robotics teams located in the vicinity of the scientists and engineers who were responsible for the mission. These teams would be visited by the scientists/engineers, and would be responsible for leading groups of younger kids (middle school age) in an art project which would be included in the Mural.

So, without further adieu....

The Point - and how you can get your team involved

Below is a list of towns/cities where the companies and individuals who made the Mars Exploration Rovers reside.

Now here is what I ask of you:

If your team is located in or near (within an hour of) any of the following cities, would you be interested in being a part of this project?I look forward to hearing back from some of you. Upon response, I will provide you with the needed information to become involved.

-- Jaine

(Of course, I will not rely solely on this thread to find teams. If nobody comes forward for a location, I will find them and contact the teams myself. However, I felt that before I do all that work, I should ask for volunteers first).

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

Sounds like an amazing opportunity.
I'll call for Manassas VA. Team 612 know a lot of people who actually worked on this project and some of our members are currently working with Smithsonian on the follow up projects (locally). We would glad to help in any way possible.

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

We'll take Seattle, WA.

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

Dibs on Moffet Field, though we'd be willing to share w/ 1868 (if that's allowed)!

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

Sharing is absolutely allowed!

I am thinking that where there exist multiple teams in one area, they can all collaborate with their respective schools - in otherwords, they can all meet with the same scientists/engineers to create the artwork. However, I will have to organize this case by case, depending on the response, the proximity of the teams, etc.

I should also add that if you think your team might be interested, please PM me with your mentor(s) name and contact info.

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

We'll take St. Louis, MO. Possibly some of the other 17 teams in our area will want to help also.

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

this sounds really cool. i'm sure Pink will help out in FL.

good luck all on this project.

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

This sounds so awsome! We'd love to help. Just let me talk to the rest of the girls about it

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

I guess there aren't many teams here in NC, so I'll ask mine if we can help. (Who in NC was involved?)

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

We are about 40 minutes from Allentown, PA. Just give us the details and a green light and we will help.

This sounds really fun.

Just PM me when you are ready!!


P.S.
Are you guys coming to Ramp Riot this Year?

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

Some updates and some details:

If you are interested, PM me with the contact info for your mentor(s), as well as the school(s) your team is affiliated with. I, in turn, will put your team's contact info into our database, and you will recieve more information by email as to the details of the project in your area. I am not sure how soon we will be contacting you by email... some of this is a little "fly by the seat of our pants-ish" and we appreciate your patience.

Another thing I want to add is that I can't 100% guarantee that we will be able to get scientists/engineers/technicians to come and make a visit to your team and school. I have not contacted these people yet, and although I imagine that the majority of them will be enthusiastic and willing to help, not everyone may be available. I wanted to contact you (the teams) first because I wanted to make sure that I would be able to tell them who exactly they would be working with, who they would need to contact, and where they would be doing the project. I want to arrange the setup with the teams first so that it will be easy (and less confusing) for the MER people to come in and make the project a success.

Thanks to everyone who has shown interest,
-- Jaine

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

One question. What of those teams(like mine) which don't come from any one school? We have representitives from over 6 high schools in the area,many with thier own teams. our official school is simply the only one that didn't already have a team associated with it.

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

This is not a problem at all. If your team comes from several different high schools, you can "share" the MER contact - perhaps on the day of the project, you could gather kids from all of the schools in one spot, meet with the MER contact, and do your art project all together. I will organize these meetings on a case by case basis, so don't worry! Just give me the main contact info for your team, and things will be just fine. :)

Also, another question that has been asked of me frequently is what the timeline is for this project. We are hoping to get these projects rolling starting in the fall (after school gets back in session), but whenever each team and respective contact is ready - the meetings and artwork can begin! (again, the timing of this project is case by case) In terms of when the kids' art gets incorperated into the main sculpture, that will probably happen in middle to late winter.

Thanks for your support so far!

-- Jaine

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

Our team would be happy to work with the Brookfield, Wisconsin member.
:D

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

Bobcat Robotics, team 177 is stationed out of South Windsor, CT.

I am really interested in this project, it sounds like such a neat idea!

contact me via pm or you can instant message me.

thanks, Kim

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

There is an entire art exhibit right now at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex by student artists. I haven't really gotten the chance to browse around, but i bet there are a bunch of young artists that would like to be a part of this.

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

This doesn't have to do with the art that was done by the Pink team? Or is it something else? If it's something else, could you find out more about it for me? (you know you love me Barry...) Just some contact information would be great. I have been trying to get in contact with Sheryl Bergstrom, who was in charge of launching the rovers, but I haven't been able to talk to her yet. If you don't know anything more about it, I can probably ask her once I get ahold of her.

Thanks Barry! :)

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

Read more about this great project in today's Hartford Courant article which mentions Jaine and how you are all getting involved...

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

There's a story about this in today's Waterbury Republican-American. There's also photos of the interior of the former Whiting Mills factory and of Griesedieck.

Newman's Own Foundation has pledged $200k towards this project and will go towards the renovation of the defunct Winsted, CT factory where the mural will be displayed. They're hoping this will be a large tourism draw* and earn national recognition.

The story isn't on the Rep-Am's website as of right now. There's also no mention of Jaine either. If my scanner was working (I need to get a new one) I would scan the article and attach it.


*(I know only the CT folks will get this,
but you can see I was careful not to use the words "Winsted" and "tourism" in the same sentence :p)

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

Just to let everyone know CPTV will be doing a segment on the American Mural Project. It will air this Wednesday, 11/22, at 8 pm. :)

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

418 is enjoying the process. Meeting with people who work closely with the rovers is so cool. We were in the department of Atmospheric Sciences at A&M College Station last week. A side trip was a tour of the building, including the observation deck where they study different weather phenomenon. In Texas, if you don't like the weather, just wait a minute, it will change.

We are hoping to have our art project ready for ship before the Christmas holidays arrive. That's the plan anyway. Good stuff, this.
Jane

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

The plan changed to May '07. The team has finished the project and I've promised to post a photo in the thread. It's been raining all weekend and hasn't cooperated with the promise. When I post the photo, I'll also give a very brief summary of what we did and how the process went. Briefly, it has been a great experience for the members of the team who participated. And the cool thing is, we are shipping a sculpture that is a result of a partnership in our school with the art department and a visit with a professor at Texas A&M - out east for the mural.

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

Ok, so this is a wire sculpture of a dust devil.
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2...dustdevils.htm
Our team met with Dr. Mark T. Lemmon at Texas A&M, College Station, to discuss Mars dust and how it affects the Mars rovers. From that lecture/discussion the team came up with how they best wanted to portray their time spent with Dr. Lemmon. It developed into the dust devil - a sculpture shape that will make a nice addition to the American Mural Project, we hope. A small group of LASA Robotics team members and art students who joined the team for this project, traveled to A&M and then made the project decisions together. One of the art students worked closely with our lead teacher, Mr. Bertucci (shown in the photo), along with our art teacher, Mr. Newman. The sculpture was constructed in the shop. The project was introduced to the team last June after I read Jaine's post and it was finished this past week. We met with Dr. Lemmon in late fall after school had started and waited until we were finished with our competition seasons (we also compete during the fall semester in BEST) to complete the sculpture. It is a worthwhile project and I would encourage all of you to read Jaine's original post, discuss it with your teams, and contribute to Ellen Griesedieck's American Mural Project.

Jane

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

very cool. our team will also be at IRI and we are participating in the project as well. i'd love to talk more with you about it

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

Hey mrs. p -
If you are talking to me, I would love to share the experience. Ellen and Jaine have asked me to put together a how-to summary that includes some of the roadblocks we ran into. I would be happy to help in any way.
Jane

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

awesome, hopefully we'll find a few spare minutes at IRI. thanks for the offer

Re: Honoring Scientists and Engineers with Art
 

Just letting everybody know... there was a recent article in the New York Times about Ellen and the American Mural Project. I wanted to share it with you, so here it is!

"A Mural that Redefines the Word 'Big'" - New York Times

Also, as sort of a general update - I am once again working for Ellen this summer on the project. Things have indeed moved along a lot slower than anticipated. Part of the reason is that I wasn't able to work here after I went to school. However, we have quite a few projects slated for this coming fall!

As Marion mentioned, Team 233 will be working with the NASA Kennedy Space Center launch crew on the project. Team 1011 should be meeting up with Dr. Peter Smith from Arizona State University in the fall. The Deep Space Network will be pairing with a team from Lancaster, California. Team 1732 (John and Sue Wanninger's team) have met with Dr. Mike Wolff from the Space Science Institute in Wisconsin. Team 1917 is making arrangements to work with a geologist from the USGS who worked on the Microscopic Imager. Recently, Ellen made a trip out to JPL - recieving appropriate permissions from NASA and discussing the arrangement of a large scale project there. Overall, some very exciting news!

-- Jaine