KSR Monthly Report- Vijay Raju

1) I learned a lot from the readings and videos. From the materials that we went over in class I realized new ways to think of this project such as the environmental conscious and up-cycle approach to building the sculpture

2) The photos from the site visit gave me some insight into what has to go into the sculpture mechanically to make it run.

3) The kinetic sculpture website has tons of knowledge and info to make the sculpture the best it can possibly be. It has a section of do's and dont's in the build and race process.

4) Without community partnerships this project would be near impossible. It takes cooperation and determination to complete a project. Resources are also needed, which is why community partnerships are also important.

5) I think the main thing that I have learned about the design process is that the group has no shortage of creative ideas. The amount of creativity in this group is amazing! Different ideas are never put down, instead they are welcomed. Another meaningful part of the design process is the group members different backgrounds. We have artists, engineers, cyclists, and free thinkers. Overall this group is perfect for building a kinetic sculpture.

6) I think the representation of art and symbols is a good way to tell our story. The KSR recycling drive came out really nice and believe they will have a huge impact on the UMBC community.

Team Member Introduction: Jack Neumeier

I've always been too stubborn or impatient to follow the dreams and orders of others;I sucked so badly at following that I had to learn to lead.

My time at UMBC has been defined by that struggle: finding the way to bring all of the talents and passions of our campus together to create beauty, help others, and move.

The Garden began over a year ago. As originally conceived, through a community food garden we would bring together the disparate forces that define our University's unique nature of higher education: our diversity, our focus on undergraduate research, and our burgeoning emphasis on civic agency.

Today, with over 12,000 sq ft, The Garden is most obviously a physical space aimed at addressing food issues. It's also about "enabling people to discover how their special talents and passions could be blended with others' to build community and shape our world" as written by UMBC's David Hoffman.

This mission bears itself out in an incredibly broad assortment of projects, indelible embellishments for our campus, that are detailed here: http://my.umbc.edu/groups/thegarden/news/46683

All of this--all of it--comes to KSR with me.

I am here first as someone with a deep academic interest in Democracy and Higher Education. I am working to describe the qualities of applied learning experiences and justify them in relation to learning outcomes we traditionally expect. It is my belief that learning should always engage all manners of people and all ways of the mind--clearly KSR is an example of that ambition made real.

My goal is to link this work back to our University as an institution, and that institution to our Democracy--how are we ensuring the most vibrant democracy made up of the most participatory, engaged citizens?

Make them build shit.

Then race it.

Team Member Introduction: Andres Camacho

In my element

I like to think of myself as a story teller. Story, like my love of knee deep snow, has always been an important part of my life. Narrative defines how I make meaning of the world. I am a senior at UMBC and a member of the Interdisciplinary Studies department. Through my degree, titled "Entrepreneurship and Digital Communication",  I strive to develop my ability at using the power of story to create both digital and physical spaces that allow people to interact with seemingly abstract values (such as sustainability) in a way that is meaningful to their own life experiences.

What purpose will our kinetic sculpture serve?

As a member of this Kinetic Sculpture Race team I would like to create a digital narrative that answers the above question by shedding light on the issue of linear resource streams, the burden that plastic waste puts on the environment, and the opportunities for "up-cycling" resources such as plastic.  I like websites that make use of vertical movement to present information in a visual  and dynamic manner. Here is an example: http://lostworldsfairs.com/atlantis/. Will post soon with more details about the content and scope of the digital component of our sculpture project.

Community partner visit: the Baltimore Foundery

Andres, Jack, Ryan and I helped out today at the Foundery cleanup. I helped to get an old Shop Vac working again, an we swept, vacuumed, and moved tables and equipment around.

Behind Jack and Andres is a laser cutter; the Superman symbol that Andres is holding and the wooden eyeglasses on Jack were both made in that machine.

 

This is Audrey Van de Castle, self described "welder blacksmith sculptor bad ass"  and instructor at B'More Foundery. If we have any hope of welding together a frame that won't come apart during the race down Key Highway, this is our Goddess.

Design Idea #2: Plastic Bottle Boat

With about 1000 pounds of bikes and riders to float in the Baltimore Harbor, how many plastic bottles would it take? How will we integrate boat hull and bicycle frames? Let me know if you figure that out.

Great Moments in Recycling

We received our beautiful "KSR plastic bottle drive" posters yesterday from Commonvision. The design, mostly hand drawn by team member Mai Huynh, features an image of a plastic water bottle and the sketch of a city street around it. I set up a collection bin with the sign in front of it, and then returned a few hours later to see how many bottles we collected.
By 9:30 pm we had collected... one Starbucks coffee cup. Was this a subtle hint that we should construct the sculpture out of coffee cups instead? After all, Americans dispose of 25 billion coffee cups per year (http://www.carryyourcup.org/get-the-facts).
But as I looked around the hallway in which the bin was placed, there were no trash cans or other kinds of recycling.  So I placed a trash can next to the collection bin.
So we shall see if the trash alternative helps. In the meantime, what do we do with all the coffee cups??

Generative tensions

In graduate school my arts in education professor, Jessica Hoffmann Davis, framed our analyses in terms of "generative tensions." As I listen to artists and engineers and environmental educators and entrepreneurs negotiate what form our kinetic sculpture might take, I can hear how generative - how creative - such tension can be. The artist has been asking questions primarily about engineering and the engineers ask about the form the art will take. Does form follow function, or vice versa? Will the spectators understand our theme of sustainability (our "up cycle")? How will we interact with the crowd? Can the sculpture also serve as a musical instrument as well as a sculpture and a pedal powered cycle that can float?