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I will briefly discuss the history of research-related projects that Mark Burgin and I worked on together. I will then discuss our joint research related to the circle of sense and nonsense. One paper was entitled In a search for deeper meanings: navigating the circle of Sense and Nonsense and in turn articulating logical varieties as knowledge illuminators and the second was entitled In the Circle of Sense and Nonsense, Including A Mathematic Model of Meaning. This research represents a bridge between the media arts and sciences (my artwork) as a means of embodying ideas exploring a particular approach to meaning production and related computation, as well as Burgin's concepts related to logical varieties and mathematical models of meaning. I will refer to the full papers and links because they present a very robust and full articulation of the concepts discussed here. In this paper, I will briefly touch on the areas of research, supply short definitions, and refer to the relevant historical publications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At the beginning of the 20th century, the eclectic artist Mariano Fortuny y Madrazo patented two innovative methods for polychrome printing on fabrics and textiles, giving life to Fortuny fabric production in Venice. The first patent was related to colour application, while the second to a special machine that allows continuous printing using cylindrical rollers. Despite the descriptions, the methodology and materials used remain a secret. In collaboration with the Fortuny Museum in Venice, this research aimed at studying and identifying the different steps of Fortuny printing methodologies. Printing matrices, fabrics and raw materials found in the artist's studio were analysed in a multi-analytical campaign through digital microscopy, X-ray fluorescence (XRF), Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy in attenuated total reflectance (FTIR-ATR), μ-Raman spectroscopy and gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC–MS). Three main pigments were identified in paper samples: ivory black, a copper-based pigment, and a carbon black pigment with ultramarine for blues. The pigments were bound with linseed oil and colophony in varying proportions. Polychrome silk fabrics were dyed with a base colour, and then the coloured patterns were superimposed by continuous printing. Prussian blue was identified as one of the textile inks. Results provided a better understanding of printing methodology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Learning around artificial intelligence (AI)-powered technologies that attends to power is an urgent and widely felt priority among the learning sciences and CS ed broadly. Popular approaches to AI education focus on technical skills, with far less theoretical and practical work around critical and justice-centered AI learning. Adding to this literature, we discuss tool design and observed interactions in Drag vs AI workshops, where participants use hands-on makeup art as a medium for fooling, subverting, and refusing facial recognition. Our broader analysis asks how participants make sense of the technical and political aspects of AI, as they interact with AI through the Drag vs AI workshops' modes of aesthetic transformation, tinkering, and resistance. In this paper, we focus on participants' embodied algorithmic tinkering with AI and affordances for justice-centered computing education. Our analysis highlights how tinkering and play modes of interaction with AI materials can promote critical and agentive learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides an overview of the trade in artists' materials in Canton between 1750 and 1842. Through an investigation of China's foreign trade archives and records, this study gives a picture of international trade in artists' materials, particularly pigments, during this period in Canton. Furthermore, it reveals a close trade in Western modern pigments between the West and China. The results of this research may be helpful to conservators and conservation scientists conducting treatments or technical studies on Chinese export paintings of this period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents ethnographic research from Journey: Bridging Cultures, a UK-based project that worked with school-aged youths with forced migration backgrounds. Between January 2020 and July 2021, participants and facilitators co-produced a multimedia chamber orchestra work about students' experiences in countries of origin, transit, and destination to present to members of the Oxford community. Through this case study, we explore the translation of refugee narratives into artworks for public audiences, deconstructing the social processes and power negotiations inherent in its crafting and transmission. In conversation with scholarship on arts-based research with refugees, Michel Callon's theory of translation (1984) is mobilised to position translation as both the product and process of multiple mediations. The context of co-productive artistic creation highlights the extent to which marginalised populations shape how their narratives are translated and performed. Such participants may redirect the trajectory of an artistic project through strategies of partial- and non- engagement, but these are balanced against external influences including the parameters of the artistic medium, expectations of imagined audiences, and internalised narratives about what stories to tell. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we assess the impact of the COVID‐19 pandemic on the Australian visual arts sector. We base our analysis on the responses of over 1500 visual artists and arts workers to a survey conducted by the National Association for the Visual Arts (NAVA), the national peak body for the visual and media arts, craft and design sector in September 2021. NAVA employed this online survey to study the relationship between the pandemic and both the incomes and mental health of artists and arts workers. Using regression analysis, we find that there has been a significant impact for both artists and arts workers, with the severity of the impacts varying by gender, age and the availability of state‐based and Australian Government support programmes. Reduced hours and loss of contracted work and commissions due to the pandemic were both related to declines in income and mental health outcomes for artists and for arts workers. Housing stress was associated with a higher likelihood of a significant or extreme mental health impact for artists and arts workers. In addition, artists' incomes and mental health outcomes were impacted when faced with a reduced ability to sell, although some artists were able to increase their online profiles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An in‐depth technical examination and conservation treatment of paintings by William Williams (Bristol 1727–1791 Bristol) has shed light on the artist's materials and technique. This investigation centered primarily on Williams's two 1766 portraits of William and David Hall. The paintings are considered the earliest life‐sized, full‐length portraits executed in the Philadelphia area. The analysis of the artist's palette indicated deliberate choices in the use of orpiment (As2S3). The mineral's tendency to oxidize to colorless and water‐soluble arsenic oxides likely caused color changes and degraded organic binder in the orpiment‐rich areas. μ‐XANES revealed orpiment photodegradation to arsenate species at the paint surface, with migration to the ground layers. Just below the paint surface, arsenic remains bound primarily as arsenite, with some associated with sulfur as orpiment. This As distribution suggests that the paint is liable to further degradation by photooxidation and use of moisture would be detrimental. Given this treatment‐critical degradation phenomenon, it was important to identify all arsenic‐containing areas of both portraits. Scanning XRF allowed rapid and accurate collection of maps from both portraits. Elemental maps of arsenic identified the orpiment‐rich areas of the painting, which would be susceptible to further degradation upon exposure to water during treatment. An aqueous adhesive was necessary to consolidate the cupped paint of the glue‐paste lined paintings. The arsenic maps guided the use of two different consolidants–BEVA 371 for the water‐sensitive orpiment‐rich paint and sturgeon glue for all other areas, striking a compromise between esthetic improvement and long term preservation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Interdisciplinary courses and activities are becoming more popular as the benefits of collaboration have become apparent. For example, collaboration between different disciplines in organizations, such as engineering and marketing, has been shown to significantly enhance the product development process. Various strategies have been used to encourage this collaboration. One strategy is to provide instruction in collaboration across disciplines at the undergraduate collegiate level. This case study discusses an interdisciplinary project between Marketing Research, Engineering, and Media Arts. The basic design of the initial course, strategies used to enhance collaboration, student learning outcomes, identification of key issues affecting the interdisciplinary project, and a revised design for teaching future interdisciplinary projects are included. Also included are some of the major challenges and design issues with interdisciplinary work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The materialist conception of art understands art in relation to the material conditions within and by which art is produced and consumed. For cultural psychology, the materialist conception of art has been useful for developing insights into how individual perceptions are shaped, and are shaped by, culture as a collectively produced and historically embedded site of meaning-making. However, in much of cultural psychology, the relationship between progressive politics and the materialist conception of art remains under-appreciated. In this article, I consider how cultural psychologists might strengthen this relation through artistic shock, that is, a subjective, perceptual, and/or historiographical rupture brought about through the experience of art. In particular, I outline how Bertolt Brecht and Walter Benjamin theorised and practiced artistic shock, and examine what the work of these thinkers could mean for cultural psychologists working with political collectives to grapple with psychopolitical questions related to subjectivity, contradiction, and memory. I conclude by reflecting on how future work that seeks to politicise cultural psychology might engage with the materialist conception of art. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From the social media movement 'Now You See Me Moria' to the Hope Art Project, refugees in Lesvos are using digital platforms to disrupt restrictive legislation, practices and discourses inflicted on them by state authorities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Art-based parental training involves engaging the parents in creative processes and the observation of their art products. The current paper presents guidelines for art-based parental training, based on the assumption that the encounter between the world of art and the world of therapy creates a rich triangular relationship between therapist, parent, and artwork. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 15 art therapists who described their experiences and the interventions they have developed for parents. The findings show how these interventions can be applied in clinical settings and how these art therapists see the impact of these art-based interventions on the therapeutic process. Most therapists believe that encouraging parents to create spontaneously and authentically in a suitable environment that contains a range of art materials for painting and sculpture can support the initiation of emotional communication on the part of the parents with themselves, their partner, and their child. In this type of therapy, the parents' responses and the creative product are primordial since they are considered to reflect the parents' development, personal skills, fields of interest, concerns, and difficulties. The guidelines are derived from these findings. • Guidelines for art-based parental training (ABPT model) are presented. • 15 art therapists describe art interventions they developed for treating parents. • Provides examples, case studies and applications in clinical settings. • Environments with art materials support parental emotional communication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present a novel approach for automatically classifying illustrations from historical Chinese local gazetteers using modern deep learning techniques. Our goal is to facilitate the digital organization and study of a large quantity of digitized local gazetteers. We evaluate the performance of eight state-of-the-art deep neural networks on a dataset of 4,309 manually labeled and organized images of Chinese local gazetteer illustrations, grouped into three coarse categories and nine fine classes according to their contents. Our experiments show that DaViT achieved the highest classification accuracy of 93.9 per cent and F1-score of 90.6 per cent. Our results demonstrate the effectiveness of deep learning models in accurately recognizing and categorizing historical local gazetteer illustrations. We also developed a user-friendly web service to enable researchers easy access to the developed models. The potential for extending this method to other collections of scanned documents beyond Chinese local gazetteers makes a significant contribution to the study of visual materials in the arts and history in the digital humanities field. The dataset used in this study is publicly available and can be used for further research in the field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fredrik Barth called attention to two ways ritually transmitted knowledge gains value: knowledge he associated with the figure of the 'Guru' valued for being widely shared versus knowledge associated with the figure of the 'conjurer' or 'initiator' valued for the opposite reason. In this article, I argue that there is another kind of ritual knowledge-transmitter who holds an appropriately 'in-between' position: the spirit medium. During 'demonstrations', mediums in the Spiritualist tradition offer signs from the spirit world for their audiences to recognise in relation to their deceased loved ones. Whereas Gurus (in Barth's typology) are likely to be storytellers and conjurers are not, mediums are distinct for telling what I call 'protonarratives'. Protonarratives are character sketches joined with allusions to events or signs that suggest stories. They are not narrative in form, but can evoke stories that live in listeners' memories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research provides a comprehensive overview of micro-influence marketing, analyzing the characteristics of influencers and the mechanisms of their impact. A systematic review was conducted, encompassing 2091 citing articles and references across 74 studies involving 95 research institutions and over 12,000 samples. Employing an interdisciplinary approach that integrates insights from computer science, information science, communication, culture, psychology, sociology, education, business, and management, this study outlines the distinct features of micro-influencers. These features include performable authenticity, affinity expressed through consistency and transparency, musical and artistic media talent, and competitive individual traits. The research synthesizes antecedents of trust and attachment mechanisms commonly employed in influencer theory, taking an objective standpoint and minimizing emphasis on audience engagement and perception to trigger influence. The findings highlight that followers' pursuit of self-branding, driven by self-consciousness, social consciousness, credibility, and social presence, significantly influences the impact of self-expressive products on the audience's purchase intention. The research contributes to micro-influence marketing theory by integrating mechanics, offering practical implications for micro-influencers, and suggesting future research agendas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to Martin Heidegger, the work of art reveals the truth. But this is not in every work of art, but only in a real art! But which work has the possibility of accepting the title of a real art? Heidegger himself has mentioned some of these works. But how can a criterion be extracted from The Origin of the Work of Art? A criterion that can assess whether the work has the ability to approach what Heidegger calls a work of art? Can this criterion be applied to artistic mediums, other than what Heidegger himself discussed? Medium like cinema? In this research, we have tried to provide a criterion for evaluating the film; The terms of this criterion are: non-representation, nonabstraction from everydayness and non-belonging. In the continuation of the research, just to reveal the proposed criterion, the movie The Wind Will Carry Us directed by Abbas Kiarostami was discussed and the criterion terms were evaluated for that movie. This film satisfies the terms of criterion. Based on this, it can be said that based on Heidegger's thought, a criterion can be obtained regarding artistic medium such as cinema. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The tendency to reduce the movements of performers in media art to data results in a flattening of identities and makes the performers' essence seemingly insignificant. Two case studies showcase what might be lost through datafication, even as they resist it: Lucinda Childs "walking" in Bach 6 Solo by Robert Wilson, and Michael Jackson standing still at the start of his 1993 Super Bowl Halftime show. The desire to detach the body from aesthetic significance can be traced back to America's historical racism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Below the Blanket (2019), a performance installation at the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh, staged the enmeshed multispecies relationships present in the Flow Country, the largest blanket bog system in the world. While Below the Blanket represented the Flow Country through various artistic mediums, the physical matter—the sphagnum and peat mosses—that comprises the bog was conspicuously absent. Using critical plant theory, ecodramaturgies, and performance theory, this article grapples with the ethics of staging ecological matter such as mosses within the colonial contexts of the botanic garden and provides insights into the complex ethics of ecological performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses three major exhibitions in London that disrupt traditional understandings of the past and invite viewers to imagine fantastical futures. The Hayward Gallery's "The Black Fantastic" showcases Nick Cave's Soundsuits, which erase the appearance of race and gender. TATE Britain's "The Procession" by Hew Locke features elaborate costumes and explores themes of politics, greed, race, and history. The Victorian and Albert Museum's "Africa Fashion" celebrates the creativity and innovation of African designers and examines the strategic political act of making and wearing indigenous cloth. These exhibitions aim to challenge assumptions and clichés about Africa and address racism and social injustice. [Extracted from the article]

The article discusses the Textile Garden exhibition at the Museum für Gestaltung in Zürich, which showcases 63 works from the New Tapestry movement of the 1960s to the present day. The exhibition explores themes such as Stone, Weather, Growth, Blossom, Water, Field, Temple, Harvest, and Transience, and features works from the collections of the Museum für Gestaltung and Fondation Toms Pauli. The exhibition highlights the use of cords, yarns, and threads as raw materials by international textile artists to expand the possibilities of their art. The article also mentions specific artists and their works that are featured in the exhibition, emphasizing the diverse techniques and materials used in textile art. [Extracted from the article]

The 4th Hangzhou Triennial of Fiber Art took place at the Zhejiang Art Museum from October 18 to December 5, 2022. Despite the pandemic preventing international artists from attending the opening ceremony, the exhibition utilized online platforms to increase its visibility. The theme of the exhibition, "Being Theoria," aimed to provide a space for contemplation and reflection. The artworks on display included installations, sculptures, and textiles, exploring the relationship between fiber and culture. The exhibition also highlighted the growth of Chinese artists in the field of fiber art. Overall, the Hangzhou Fiber Art Triennial is a global exhibition that showcases a diverse range of artworks, fostering connections between different countries and regions with rich textile industries and craft histories. [Extracted from the article]

The politics of our post-Covid times are expressed through various registers. In Kolkata, one especially powerful artistic medium for such expressions was the revival of street theatre as young and senior theatre practitioners plunged into exploring critical issues that have been all-pervasive since the beginning of the pandemic. As people finally started to venture out, content to be amidst human congregations, street plays, being located in open-air spaces, proved both economical and safe. The issues these street performances highlighted and their modes of presentations could be described as what Tony Fisher calls 'activist theatre' – which mobilizes the people by interpellating its audience around a specific grievance or issue that possesses an emotional appeal. These performances are a form of artistic activism, or 'artivism' as termed by Chantal Mouffe: the use of aesthetic means for political activism, 'as a counter-hegemonic move against the capitalist appropriation of aesthetics'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article informs about the potential use of thermal cameras in primary school classrooms, presenting various activities to enhance student learning about heat energy topics. Topic include discusses how thermal cameras can make abstract concepts tangible, citing research that supports their effectiveness in addressing misconceptions and promoting advanced reasoning skills among primary-level students.

The bronze doors of the Basilica of San Zeno in Verona, Italy, are a special case in art history research. They were made by several workshops during the twelfth century: stylistically, two to three workshops were assumed to produce the metal parts of the door. However, it is still unclear when exactly and if this interpretation can be supported by the chemical composition of the metal. In this research we aimed to verify the art history interpretation by identifying the alloy composition of each individual metal plate. The composition of the supporting wooden structures are discussed. A portable ED-XRF instrument and optical microscopes were used to analyse and document the doors non-invasively. The doors were also photographed to produce high resolution orthophotos and 3D models. We can confirm that the metal parts of the doors were made of leaded tin-bronze as well as leaded brass and mounted on a wooden structure mainly made of spruce and oak wood. Chemically, two/three different groups of alloys have been identified, which can be associated with two or three different workshops, and which largely correspond to the stylistic interpretation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study concerned a diagnostic spectroscopic campaign carried out on the panel painting depicting the Coronation of the Virgin (first half of the 15th century) by the late-Gothic Italian painter Michele di Matteo. The main aims were the identification of the original painting materials and the characterization of the painter's artistic technique. A combined approach based on non- and micro-invasive techniques was employed. Visible and ultraviolet-induced fluorescence photography was used to select the areas of interest for spectroscopic analyses; X-ray radiography assessed the state of conservation of the support, while X-ray fluorescence and external reflection Fourier transform infrared spectroscopies allowed the chemical identification of pigments, binders, and varnishes. Attenuated total reflection infrared spectroscopy, optical microscopy, and scanning electron microscopy coupled with energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy were used to visualize and characterize the materials in the pictorial layers. The results highlighted the presence of pigments, possibly applied with an egg binder, consistent with the period of the production of the painting, as well as modern pigments used during subsequent restorations: an imprimitura with lead white and a gypsum-based ground layer. Concerning the gilding, the guazzo technique was confirmed by identifying a red bolo substrate and gold leaf. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Paternal involvement in household and childcare has increased over the past century, but global studies show that most mothers still remain responsible for a significantly higher proportion of total household care and childcare. Moreover, the COVID-19 pandemic has further negatively impacted mothers, who take on the majority of childcare responsibilities. However, scholars agree that a father's devotion to playing with the child fosters the child's cognitive, linguistic, and socio-emotional development. Acknowledging and approaching art as a dynamic and integrated play, this qualitative case study investigates five South Korean father-child dyads and their interactions while playing with art materials. The participants engaged in three thematic art sessions designed by the author. Data collection involved audio and video recordings of each session, surveys of adult participants, and photos of finished artworks. The study found that fathers' varied educational backgrounds and perceptions of their abilities to facilitate arts learning influenced their confidence in teaching the arts at home. Furthermore, having a theme and prompting questions assisted the fathers to facilitate more focused art play. The art play also provided the father-child dyads with arts learning opportunities, including learning and distinguishing colors and recognizing stereotypes associated with colors. Moreover, one-on-one interaction between the dyads helped them build a more intimate bond. This study presents specific examples of art activities and participants' responses, which might offer insights and educational implications for paternal involvement in child play and thematic art play at home. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the introductory history of science course at the University of Edinburgh. The course, which has been offered since 1972, aims to provide students with a broad understanding of the history of science and its relevance to their lives. The course is designed to be flexible and allows students to choose their own readings from a curated resource list. The course materials are arranged thematically, covering topics such as cosmologies, abstractions, lives, bodies, quantities, and objectivities. The author also mentions the use of a kaleidoscope as a metaphor for the course, emphasizing the diversity and dynamism of the field of science. The course materials are freely available online under a Creative Commons license. [Extracted from the article]

The 18th International Conference on Language and Social Psychology (ICLASP18: 2024) will take place from June 12 to 15, 2024, at Tallinn University Baltic Film, Media and Arts School in Tallinn, Estonia. The conference aims to bring together scholars from various disciplines, including anthropology, sociology, communication, applied linguistics, and social psychology, to explore the role of language in society. The conference will feature keynote speakers from universities around the world and will result in a special issue or two of the Journal of Language and Social Psychology in 2025. The deadline for proposal submissions is February 1, 2024, and authors will be notified of the status of their submissions by March 1, 2024. For more information, visit the conference website. [Extracted from the article]

The sodium-ion battery (Na-ion battery, NIB) is considered the most promising post-lithium energy storage technology, taking advantage of using the same manufacturing technology as Li-ion batteries (LIBs), while enabling the use of more abundant and economic, thus more sustainable, raw materials. Due to the inability of Na+ ions to be intercalated within the graphene-layered structure of graphite-based electrodes (the state of art anode material in LIBs), highly disordered and microporous carbons, known as hard carbons, are considered the anode material of choice for NIB technology. Biomass-derived biochar (BC) is one of the most relevant classes of hard carbons, exhibiting a good combination of sustainable fabrication, structural-morphological features and electrochemical performances. In this review, the main achievements on BC are rigorously reported from the production to the application into NIBs, with particular emphasis on the strategies to improve the electrochemical behaviour of BC by activating it and tailoring its chemical and structural properties. These strategies include selecting specific feedstocks, modulation of the pyrolysis temperature, pre- and post-production treatments, and materials engineering. The possible role of BC in sustainable NIBs development is also briefly discussed, together with some insights of its use in other post-Li energy storage systems and some concluding remarks and future direction of the research. • Na-ion battery is amongst the most promising post-Li energy storage technologies. • Na-ion battery requires the use of hard carbon as anode materials. • Biochar is one of the most relevant classes of hard carbons. • Biochar structure and chemical features can be tuned during or after production. • Main results on biochar in batteries are reported, from production to application. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Young individuals with Sickle Cell Disease (SCD) risk severe physical complications and psychosocial stressors. Art therapy is a psychosocial resource offered to youth with SCD in several medical settings across the United States. The purpose of this qualitative study was to better understand art therapy clinical practices with young individuals with SCD in a medical setting through thematic and content analysis. We interviewed 21 art therapists with clinical experience with this population. Data analysis suggests that participants utilize a person-centered approach and consider several factors (e.g., patient assessment, patient-specific factors and potential psychosocial stressors and physical complications) when determining their clinical decisions before and during the art therapy intervention. Clinical goals, art materials, and art therapist engagement mutually influence each other throughout the session. The art therapist remains flexible and adapts their intervention procedures as necessary to meet the in-the-moment needs of the patient. Additionally, data analysis revealed that participants regularly encounter several challenges and barriers related to working with this population and that the race of the art therapist contributes to additional challenges and barriers. This research study serves as an initial step to understanding how art therapists work with young individuals with SCD. Further research involving patients' voices is necessary to better understand patients' subjective experiences and the impact of art therapy on young individuals with SCD. • Art therapists use person-centered therapeutic approach in work with youth with SCD. • Art therapy needs to consider biomedical complications and psychosocial stressors. • Art Therapists experience several barriers and challenges in work with youth with SCD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]