Rome Projects
[1] Mapping Science: Rome [http://rome.mappingscience.net] For my mapping project, I'm creating three pathways through Rome, each of which represents a different aspect of the scientific process: Observation, Collection, and Comparison. Each path will contain a number of nodes; Each node will have an essay or interview, a multimedia interactive, and a paper-craft model to download and make: a paper microscope, sundial, entomology collection, etc. For example, one node on the Observation path will be the Galilean telescope reproduction that I'm building and will place out in the garden behind the Academy - one point on the map. That node will have a paper telescope model, an essay on shifting concepts of objectivity, and a 360 degree photographic panorama of the telescope in situ, with views into the telescope. Currently, I'm hand-drawing maps of the city, which I'll then digitize and integrate into the Google map API, so viewers will zoom from node to node in my hand-drawn city. Some of the other pathway nodes include Enrico Fermi's lab on the Via Panisperna, a Jeremy-Bentham-inspired panopticon prison viewable from the Gianicolo, and the first microscope slides from the 18th century in the Academy dei Lincei in Trastevere.
[2] Galilean Telescopes
I'm also making several functional reproductions of one of Galileo's telescopes out of turned wood, paper tubes, and hand-ground lenses, which I'll put out in the back of the Academy for some star-gazing during the Galileo Cabaret in April 2011.
[3] Callimachus Redux
Inspired by the Pinakes of Callimachus - a catalog of the library of Alexandria done in poetic form - I'm working on creating my own version using the catalog of the Museo Galileo in Firenze (formerly the Istituto e Museo di Storia della Scienza). For each entry I'm writing a poem, which I'll then collect and print in a double-folio sized book, based on the scientific atlases of the 18th - 19th centuries.
[4] Meta + Morphē
Collapsing ideas from the comparative anatomy charts of the 19th century into Ovid's catalog of mythic creatures in his Metamorphoses ("Transformations"), I'm constructing a life-size drawing of minotaurs, fauns, hapless mortals, and gods vying for power and dominance. The drawing is constructed out of hundreds of small pieces of vellum, each printed with a portion of Ovid's text and a section of the drawing. Overlapped and pinned to the wall, the vellum pages create the full panoramic image.
Digital sketches for 'Mapping Science: Rome'
Digital sketches for 'Mapping Science: Rome'
Digital sketches for 'Mapping Science: Rome'
Galileo telescope reproduction [in process]
Lenses for Galilean telescopes
Lens for Galilean telescope
Drawing a map of Rome for 'Mapping Science: Rome'
'Callimachus Redux' book prototype
'Meta + Morphē' sketch for panorama
'Natural Histories [Revised]'
'Episteme'
'Specimen'
'An Ordered Universe'
'Mnemonic Almanac'
Adrian Van Allen is a multimedia artist, writer, designer and anthropologist. She creates multimedia exhibits and web sites for the Exploratorium Museum, NASA, the Smithsonian, the University of California at Berkeley, and was founding Creative Director of ReadyMade magazine. She is currently a National Science Foundation GRF Research Fellow in the Anthropology Department at UC Berkeley and is a Rome Prize Fellow in Design at the American Academy in Rome. Van Allen's art work and research engage the history of science, emerging technology and taxonomy through installations, interactive media art, video, scale models, artist books, works on paper, and transgenic taxidermy. She holds dual Master of Fine Arts degrees from California College of Art in Interactive Media and Photography, a Bachelor’s degree in Cognitive Science from Sarah Lawrence College, and is currently pursuing a PhD in the Anthropology of Science at UC Berkeley.
She has created site-specific installations for Genetic Savings and Clone, The Exploratorium, and Southern Exposure Gallery. Her web-based art, videos, and CD-ROM kits have exhibited internationally at such venues as The North-by-Northwest Media Festival in Liverpool, UK, The Pacific Film Archive in Berkeley, Cantor Center for the Arts at Stanford University, and the Public Netbase Media Center in Vienna, Austria. She has received two Webbys, a Golden Muse award, and has received grants from the National Science Foundation, the American Academy in Rome, the Film Arts Foundation, New Langton Arts, and Women's Studio Workshop. She has been an artist-in–residence at the Kala Art Institute, at the Headlands Center for the Arts, and at the Djerassi Foundation. Her work has been featured at SIGGRAPH, Museums on the Web, and is included in the Rhizome.org ArtBase. She is based in Oakland, California.