Spring 2024 27 COMMON BOND: OLIVER DAY; AFTERGLOW: JAN SONNENMAIR A R T est pieces, as well as a few lesser- known gems. Data-Driven Art The two latest additions to the university’s collection are at PRAx and Cordley Hall. PRAx’s only permanent installation is a generative AI sculpture commissioned from renowned data artist Refik Anadol, whose work Unsupervised was recently acquired by the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. Patricia Valian Reser Executive Director Peter Betjemann likens the PRAx installation to a chandelier, illuminating the space above visitors’ heads as they walk through the arts center lobby. The piece is based on data provided by the U.S. Forest Service and OSU, including 10,000 hours of birdsong recorded in the Oregon Cascades by the Lesmeister Wildlife Ecology and PNW Bioacoustics Lab.The artist fed the recordings into his unique algorithm to produce a three-dimensional shape 12 feet by 4 feet by 4 feet in size. (“Refik describes it as ‘the machine dreaming,’” Betjemann said.) Once suspended in the lobby, the sculpture will be the screen onto which four mounted projectors cast a kaleidoscopically changing series of images of Oregon forests. (At press time, the sculpture hadn’t been installed yet.) Artist Ann Hamilton, known for large-scale installations like the marble mosaic in the rebuilt World Trade Center metro station, created the Percent for Art piece for the newly renovated Cordley Hall. Hamilton engraved hundreds of pavers in the Cordley courtyard with a pattern of the letters A, T, G, C and M, spelling out what researchers estimate to be the genetic sequence of the “large subunit ribosomal RNA” gene. (Ms fill in the spots where the estimate is uncertain, while A, T, G and C are the building blocks of DNA.) Hamilton also used darker pavers to write out a brief poem about biological diversity. David Maddison, the Harold E. and Leona M. Rice Professor in Systematic Entomology, explained that the large subunit ribosomal RNA gene is present in some form in all living things. Based on known organisms’ versions of the gene, researchers have reconstructed the sequence of the gene they estimate was present in the “last universal common ancestor (LUCA),” a microbe that lived about 4 billion years ago and from which all forms of life evolved. As Cordley is home to the departments of integrative biology and botany and plant pathology, Hamilton’s artwork represents all the research that takes place in the building, Maddison said. “One of the things I find appealing about it is that, for people who come and look at the courtyard, there’s a mystery there. There’s a treasure hunt that could be involved,” he said. “To me, the experience of working with Ann will be one of the signature parts of my career. We were just completely blown away.” A Different Point of View Eugene-based artist Leah Wilson, who teaches art courses at OSU, is an artist-in-residence at the HJ Andrews Experimental Forest and an embedded member of a field research team. She created the showpiece of the new Peavy Hall, the ۄ Artist Brad Rude designed the 18 bronze sculptures of A Common Bond | All Together to feel like old friends. ↘ Amorphis’ Afterglow is so immersive that visitors might not register it as art at first. The massive spiral staircase is constructed from about 700 sunset-colored aluminum strips, leading to a curved ceiling made of mirrored tiles. YOU’RE NEVER FAR FROM A MASTERPIECE, BE IT STRUCTURAL, FUNCTIONAL, BREATHTAKING OR BIZARRE.
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