kennypDESMA9

For my final event of the quarter, I attended Judith Hopf’s exhibit at the Hammer Museum.  Throughout the exhibit are several brick sculptures, some of which are pictured below.  Hopf’s biography indicates that she often builds her sculptures out of supplies found at a hardware store, thus explaining the brick.  The concept of square bricks being used within the sculptures allows for them to have this inherent look of technical perfection.  While the brick feet and hand were impressive sculptures that must have taken significant amount of time to build, my favorite was the penguin sculpture in the center of the room.  I think a large part of my appeal to it had to do with the way the square bricks still seem to resonate with this idea of technical perfection within the cylindrical frame of the sculpture.  The even levels and lines remind me of the way artists during the Renaissance began to integrate math, specifically geometry, with art. The exhibit also includes several coll

Our final topic of this quarter of space is very current and will continue to be a major focus of science and the arts for centuries to come.  My favorite topics covered in the lectures involved the first satellites and humans being sent into space. In 1957, right smack dab in the middle of the Cold War, the Soviets launched Sputnik I, the world’s first artificial satellite (NASA.gov).  While the U.S. at the time had been focusing on staying ahead of the arms race with the Soviets, the Russians chose to lap the Americans in the space race.  The size of a beach ball, Sputnik I was designed to be elegant and received massive media coverage of its launch, thanks to its ability to transmit radio signals back to Earth (History.com). Sputnik I Shortly thereafter, in 1961, the Russians secured another victory in the space race when they sent the first man into space, Yuri Gagarin (Redd).  The United States, would respond, however, with a massive push in space technology and inn