Yuri's Night World Party at NASA/Ames Research Center: April 12, 2008, Part 9 http://www.ynba.org/2008/
Written by Dennis Gonzales.
Photography by Jim Taylor, John Schultz, Kyle Cavallaro & Paul Langston.
Interview with S. Pete Worden by Dennis Gonzales.
Art and Science (Continued)
Mikel Maron put together an OpenStreetMap-related GPS-mapping and animation project with LugRadio Steve.
Sean Stevens, owner of Modern Mac Repair, created living art, which interprets the environment around it. The piece was called "Yuri Frees the Stars."
Returning to YNBA, Multimedia artist Peter Foucault, together with filmmaker John Urquhart, presented the Countdown Generator, a 5-channel video installation that utilized lo-fi cumulative mark making systems to allude to an unknown epic event about to take place.
The Coalition for Space Exploration set up a booth to promote the organization's collaboration of space industry businesses and advocacy groups in support of an inspiring agenda of human and robotic space exploration by NASA and America's space industry.
Michael Ang brought his "Strange Attractor," an ongoing exploration of the intersection of human and insect aesthetics and the role of technology in mediating the interaction between humans and animals. "Strange Attractor" consists of a modular system of artificial flowers through which the visual preferences of wild butterflies can be explored. Different flower designs are tested by recording how frequently the butterflies visit each design. To be considered successful the designs must simultaneously provoke a human aesthetic response and become parts of the physical ecosystem of the butterflies. By using flower designs inspired by the visual artwork of human artists, the project engages the human observer in the biosemiotic relationship between flower and insect. "Strange Attractor" is a conceptual example of how humans can engage in a process of design incorporating both human and non-human needs and co-existence.
Dwight Loop and Lynn Augstein devised and presented "Hunab Ku," a light/sound installation piece. The sound and light were representative of the energetic shift taking place as we approach 2012 and the end of the Mayan calendar. Deep cellular space music combined with planetary visual light images and geometric representations of the Mayan cosmology. Colorful and inspiring visual/video images, created by light artist Lynn Augstein and shown on two inflatable balloons, gave the appearance of being planetary bodies.
And returning to Ames, Flaming Lotus Girls presented a portion of their latest interactive creation, Mutopia. In its eventual form Mutopia spiraled sculptural installation of thirteen Seedpods laid out according to the Golden Ratio, a proportion found throughout art and nature. Made of interactive fire, cast aluminum, LED light, video screens, sensors, steel, copper and stainless steel, these thirteen Seedpods will lie within a 97' x 60' footprint. (See video below)
And back on the tarmac once again, the light son bikes. (See video below).
Conclusion
There were many other events, presentations, and video screenings happening throughout the show, based on themes of Space Exploration, Radical Sustainability, and the Future of Humanity.
Watching Buzz Aldrin on TV become the second man to set foot on the Moon was inspirational. I had the opportunity to meet him in person at the Media Viewing Area. This was our second meeting in two days; weíd run into each other at NASA Amesís new Lunar Science Institute ceremony the day before. (I would meet him again at a 2001: A Space Odyssey event in Beverly Hills one month later.) During our chat about my website, 2001:Exhibit, he recommended several space exploration websites and suggested contact people for those sites that he thought were cool. After our talk, I interviewed the Center Director, S. Pete Worden, for my website and we talked about his support for Yuriís Night, the mission and future of NASA, and Arthur C. Clarke.
After the long tour of music and demonstrations, I bid my friends farewell. Before going home, I created a blog post about the event and posted pictures on the 2001 Ning.com.
Yuri's Night Bay Area was probably the most diverse collection of scientists, artists, teachers, and astronauts under one roof that represented humanity, and also the largest space party on the planet. It was appropriate to honor Sir Arthur Clarke for YNBA 2008. Before Clarkeís office halted correspondence with his friends and colleagues on the Internet, I sent an invitation to his home in Sri Lanka, asking him to open up on video, Yuri's Night Bay Area for NASA Ames, in commemoration of the 40th anniversary of 2001: A Space Odyssey but his office didn't respond until March 19, the day he passed away.
NASA put out a statement on the death of Arthur C. Clarke, that same day from Alan Stern, NASA associate administrator for the Science Mission Directorate at Headquarters in Washington,
"Arthur Clarke was a gifted writer of science and science fiction, and an unparalleled visionary of the future, inspiring countless young people throughout the middle and later 20th century with his hopeful vision of how spaceflight would transform societies, economies, and humankind itself.
"Although his personal odyssey here on Earth is now over, his vision lives on through his writing; he will be sorely missed."
While our monetary welfare is in a precarious balance that can go either way, it's a great time to explore and invest in state-of-the-art technologies, which can provide scientific innovative solutions to our problems on Earth. As I said in my review of Yuriís Night '07, I highly encouraged you to attend a Yuri's Night World Party in your area and become part of the space culture.
Yuri's Night 2009
NASA Ames decided not to host a Yuriís Night 2009. Instead, NASA Ames collaborated with the new hosts, helping facilitate the eventís success in a new venue, the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco, as part of their Thursday NightLife event series . YNBA 2009 took place on April 9th.
Although NASA Ames did not host, theycollaborated with the Academy in providing speakers, exhibits, and data for visualizations. The event will include:
3-D tour of the Moon and Mars
lectures by NASAís S. Pete Worden, Yvonne Pendleton, and Bruce Damer of DigitalSpace
exhibits of NASA programs and projects
robotics
astronauts
Global Connection / GigaPan project, ultra-high-resolution imaging technology
From Earth to the Universe exhibits
Glass Optical Robotic Telescope
the electronic and ambient music for which the Yuriís Night celebrations are known
