Showcase

This paper explores Late Classic Maya art through the specifics of painted ceramicware and murals. Through my investigation, I explain why ceramics and murals in unison are especially exceptional art forms to aid in the study of Maya art and culture. ... I further discuss what painted illustration on both mediums provide to modern audiences about the Maya civilization by explaining how painted imagery on ceramics and murals elevates a colorful insight into the Maya. The Maya world builds upon already established Maya art and architecture in a way that enriches the artistic traditions and complex social systems. I also elaborate on how painted ceramics and murals, through similar techniques, styles, and iconography, played a vital role in allowing viewers to understand aspects of influential connections seen in the Maya mythology, ritual, courtly, and daily life. This paper is focused on the analysis of two ceramic vessels, the Metropolitan Vase and the Vessel with Ball Game Scene, and specific scenes from the wall paintings at Bonampak and Calakmul. The various forms of polychromatic iconography explored in this paper provides a prosperous position for surveying how the subsequent use of painted illustration attentively reflects the social, political, and cosmological structures and philosophies that the Late Classic Maya civilization was established upon and is known for today. Read more

The abject feminist art of the 1960s and 1970s shed light on the unglamorous and often outright traumatic experiences of women in the United States, rejecting notions of soft and sweet femininity. This paper examines this art with an inclusive transf ... eminist lens and finds that, while often radical for the time, many of its themes are complicit in patriarchal enforcement of bioessentialism and fail to create an actionable politics. This is particularly harmful in the current context of anti-trans legislation and pushes for queer assimilation. Timothy Morton and Chela Sandoval, among other scholars of post-humanism, assert that bioessentialism and anthropocentrism are no longer meaningful in the face of increasing scientific understanding and technological advancement, and that holding onto these concepts works to further encode bias into our world. This paper argues that this art can be reclaimed and brought into a transfeminist future by adopting a post-human understanding of gender, humanity, and nature. Read more

Xiao Lu is a contemporary artist and her first installation at the first abstract art exhibit at the Beijing National Art Museum. Her installation 'Dialogue'(1989) gained notoriety after Lu brought and fired a gun to her own work. Xiao Lu was silent ... as silent about why she did it and left the press with many questions. This paper is about her life before and after her 1989 installation. Read more

America's potters and ceramicists were regarded as essential craftsmen before 1850, however, after mass production of uniform and accessible pottery flooded American industry the need for these craftsmen and their utilitarian creations ceased being e ... ing essential. Soon after, glass products would take over and wipe out the economic value of pottery and stoneware, which had a primarily functional existence in the Midwest. Crafts are challenging Euro-centric fine art conventions and are gaining appreciation among traditional “high art.” This is crucial in conversation with the subjugations of elitism upon stoneware craftsmanship in a fine art context. In this paper, America's Midwestern stoneware evolution in value and aesthetic recognition is analyzed in examples of Indiana and Illinois potteries throughout 1830-1930. As well as how stoneware made it to the Midwest and its adaptation into an individual form separate from its German and British counterparts. Read more

The Pietà  iconography was seen almost over a hundred years before Michelangelo's sculpture and is derived from themes that were introduced in Christian art and practice centuries prior. Starting in 14th century Germany and spreading towards the Ital ... Italian peninsula, the Pietà  changed in style and meaning based on the various schools of sculpture. Along with an extensive visual language rooted in the history of Christian art, the Pietà  iconography combined the two themes of the relationship between mother and son and the interest in suffering. It also developed with influences from mystic literature and belief with a shift in emphasis on emotional connection. From this, in the artworks of Michelangelo, the Pietà  evolved from illustrating the Compassion of Mary to reflecting the pity of the artist changing its focus to Christ, the suffering man. Through the analysis of Michelangelo's three sculptures, this paper seeks to explain the history and development of the Pietà  and how it altered its appearance from grotesque to beautiful and later to a reflection of the artist's personal suffering. Read more

The artistic discipline of art conservation and restoration did not begin with its origins in the art museums. It was once only the responsibility of an artist to restore and conserve their own artworks. Before the beginning of the nineteenth century ... , the technical process of how a painting aged was not considered by artists or contemporary art historians. But, as the discipline of art conservation has matured, the way conservators and restorers preserve oil paintings now includes elements of science and technology. This paper analyses and describes the methods and practices of current art conservation and restoration in fine art museums such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, its history and current practices in the professional field. The most relevant discourse in the museum world is the intent of the artist, what works are being altered, how exactly the paintings are altered, and the techniques used to ensure that any conservation or restoration work done to the paintings is reversible in order not to jeopardize the paintings integrity as an original work. Read more

This paper discusses how The Herron School of Art created an exhibition titled, “Past is Present: Black Artists Respond to the Complicated Histories of Slavery”, curated by Jonathan Square. This is an exhibition that brings attention to slavery and i ... ts effects into modern society. The installations focus on ideas pertaining to hegemony, white supremacy, social inequalities, politics, in conjunction with showing viewers that art galleries have historically been “white spaces”. This paper examines this exhibition to help understand its social effects, as well as what social ideas affected the exhibition itself. The paper further analyzes the pieces sharing cultural experiences with an audience and looks at how different perceptions and life experiences affect what the art means and how this affects viewers. This exhibition encourages viewers to question themselves to understand how much slavery has affected African Americans' experiences in life and society. This moves viewers to understand how slavery has affected everyone's lives and shaped the ideals and standards of this society. I show in my paper how whether one wants to admit that or not is up to the viewer, however this exhibition makes these issues relevant, showing how dangerous slavery and its implications are and why a show like this was created. Read more

In partnership with our sponsor Nian Wang, our team worked to improve the device used to hold ex vivo murine tissue during High Resolution Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI). MRI images of murine tissues are used to collect qualitative and quantitativ ... e data for research studies on neurological disorders such as Alzheimer's Disease (AD). These images can become obstructed by artifacts either from movement or magnetic resonance susceptibility. Our device and the filling procedure designed for it work to eliminate these artifacts by holding the tissue in place and extracting the bubbles that are created when filling the container with a Perfluoropolyether solution. Read more

Our goal was to create a fetoscope that can manipulate existing equipment to effectively access vasculature and increase the rate of success for the procedure.

In partnership with our sponsor Dr. Angela Yepes D.D.S, IU School of Dentistry, our team worked to create a device that would allow dental students to practice administering pediatric local anesthetic without a participating patient. Currently, there ... are no physical training models for practicing such procedures before performing them on live patients. Because of variable landmark locations in pediatrics, it can be difficult for students to know where to administer the local anesthetic, which increases the risk of a dental emergency. Thus, our team created a 3D model of a pediatric jaw that will allow dental students to practice local anesthesia procedures in order to improve their skills and confidence. Read more