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This article examines blue paper as an ecological solution in drawing practice by investigating the questions of when and under which circumstances German artists in the early sixteenth century decided to use blue paper. Blue paper had several aesthetic, symbolic, and economic functions, often both referencing a geographic relationship to Italy and its tradition of drawing on blue paper, and also engaging in a world of play and imitation in workshop practices. For a better understanding of the early modern paper ecologies within which artists worked, it is necessary to regard paper production within a broader socio-cultural range, thus not only as an exchange between paper makers but also with consideration of other crafts as well as the impact of new technologies. From there we can reconsider our relationship to nature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The demand for high-grammage paper, 150 g/m2 or more, is increasing for product protection and aesthetic value. Fold cracking, resulting from high mechanical pressure during folding, considerably decreases the economic feasibility of such products for papermaking companies. Fold cracking can be reduced through creasing, but defects possibly occur as fiber bonds are broken. In this study, the fold cracking of high-grammage paper that was not treated through creasing was explored. The mechanical and folding properties of six types of pulp fibers were evaluated based on their beating degree. The fines content of the fiber differed according to the beating condition. Using pulp with low fines content improved the folding properties. The mechanical properties of hardwood pulp were enhanced with increased beating degree. The mechanical properties of softwood pulp were considerably increased, and fold cracking occurred with increasing beating degree. Therefore, to improve the fold cracking, beating should be applied appropriately, following the type and mixing ratio of pulp fibers. Finally, softwood pulp mixing is proposed as a strategy to control fold cracking while maintaining the unique characteristics of high-grammage paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the Confucian concept of learning, or xue ([character omitted]), from the perspective of ecological humanism. Through a comparative interpretation, this paper attempts to disclose the significance of Confucian xue conceived as a practice of aesthetic appreciation and creativity, emphasizing in particular its function within an eco-centric worldview. The author reviews the relevant concepts of ecological humanism as expressed in the ideas of John Dewey and Thomas Alexander, then applies these as a theoretical framework for interpreting xue and its related concepts and practices as they appear in the Confucian text the Lunyu ([characters omitted] ). It is argued that xue is a process of developing and expressing virtuosity and artistry in the "arts of life," and that its practice was understood as a direct participation in the creative development of nature. The significance of such a concept of learning for contemporary educational philosophy is discussed in conclusion.

Combining biologically active compounds with nanocarriers is an emerging and promising strategy for enhancing the activities of molecules while reducing their levels of toxicity. Green nanomaterials have recently gained momentum in developing protocols for treating and preserving artifacts. In this study, we designed a functional biohybrid material by incorporating tributyltin(IV) ferulate (TBT-F) into halloysite nanotubes (HNTs), generating a new formulation called HNT/TBT-F. The primary objective was to develop a formulation with robust antimicrobial properties and reinforcing features for treating paper with artistic and historical value. To characterize HNT/TBT-F, assess the HNT's loading capacity, and investigate the TBT-F release kinetics from the nanotubes, various analytical techniques, including UV-Vis and infrared spectroscopies, thermogravimetry, and microscopy analysis, were employed. Furthermore, we evaluated the antimicrobial potential of TBT-F and HNT/TBT-F against Kocuria rhizophila, a bacterial strain known for its opportunistic behavior and a cause of artifact biodeterioration. HNT/TBT-F exhibited a significantly stronger bactericidal effect than TBT-F alone against K. rhizophila cells growing planktonically or those forming a biofilm. This enhanced performance could relate to the confinement of TBT-F within the nanotubes, which likely improved its physical-chemical stability and increased the local concentration of TBT-F upon contact with the bacterial cells. Additionally, we evaluated the mechanical properties of a paper treated with HNT/TBT-F, assessing any potential alterations in its color. The findings of this study highlight the favorable attributes of the HNT/TBT-F formulation and its potential for developing protocols aimed at consolidating and preserving culturally significant paper objects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper the characterization of the work of art as a map of intensity, as proposed by Gilles Deleuze in his essay What the children say (gathered in Critique et clinique), will be analyzed. Art’s cartographic aspect is linked to the concept of deterritorialization and the Body without Organs that the philosopher, along with Félix Guattarí, develops in Thousand Plateaus. Thus, the art-cartography represents the becoming-world of the subject that transits the Body-without-organs and the intensive differences that populate the desert of multiplicity. Each way travelled is descripted by an artistic map where the haecceities and the thresholds of flows that pierce through the disorganized bodies are portrayed. The map of intensity would be the cartographic representation of the haul travelled by a subject immersed in a hodologic space, being every line of the map a journey within an intensive space [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Archives, ancient books, and documents kept in museums and libraries are the carriers of historic and cultural information left by our ancestors. However, these paper cultural relics can show notorious signs of degradation, e.g., fungal development. Due to the organic components of paper objects, they suffer from fungal biodeterioration. The excreted substances of fungi and the fungi's structures themselves are often colored and interfere with the readability of the artifacts, diminishing their artistic and monetary values. In this study, we collected and separated the moldy archives collected in the Archives of Shaanxi Province (China) and obtained the identification results of eight kinds of molds. Clotrimazole (CTZ) and quaternary ammonium salt chitosan (HACC) were combined to prepare a microemulsion. Synergies of CTZ and HACC could enhance the antifungal effect and reduce the required concentration of a single drug. The composite emulsion could effectively improve the retention of drugs on the surface of paper cultural relics, improve the solubility of hydrophobic drugs, and provide a data basis for the anti-mold preservation of paper cultural relics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Explains the objectives of an interdisciplinary elective course for middle school students in which the scientific principles, artistic processes, cultural aspects, and environmental concerns of papermaking are integrated. (DDR)

Objectives: Despite the widespread of assessment of smile aesthetic perception in many areas, there has yet to be a direct comparison of digital and paper-based photographs for the assessment of smile aesthetics. Here we compared digital and paper-based photographs representing different smile aesthetic features using visual analog scale (VAS) scoring. Materials and Methods: One hundred students were randomly recruited from a university campus. Participants were asked to record their perception of smile aesthetics via paper and digital-based platforms. The minimum clinically important difference between platforms was set at 15mm. The percentage of participants who rated smile attractiveness worse on digital images was recorded. The paired one-tailed Student’s t test was used to determine differences between digital and paper platforms, and Bland–Altman analysis and intraclass correlations (ICCs) were used to test for agreement between paper and digital photographs. Results: Ninety-nine subjects participated, 55 men (mean age = 22.05, standard deviation [SD] = 1.91) and 44 women (mean age 22.05, SD = 1.84). There were statistically significant differences between paper-based and digital photographs for all images except one (paired t test; P < 0.05). Digital ratings were lower than paper-based ratings for all images, and differences were clinically significant in four out of eight images. A high percentage of participants (50.5%–85.9%) rated smile attractiveness worse on digital images than on paper for all images. There was poor agreement between the two methods as assessed by ICCs and Bland–Altman analysis. Conclusion: Equivalence between paper and digital images for smile aesthetics cannot be assumed, and paperbased photographs may lead to clinically relevant overestimations of perceived attractiveness. As academic dentistry increasingly relies on digital imaging and sharing in the post-COVID-19 world, further validation of digital platforms for smile aesthetics assessment is warranted, and care should be taken when interpreting the results of studies assessing smile perception based on different platforms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Contemporary artistic practices were provided with a space for reflection and the creation of opinion in the galleries of the Fundació Espais and in the pages of its art magazine, Papers d'Art. A group of independent voices of multidisciplinary artistic production was made audible thanks to this publication that provided a critique which forged dynamic connections between artistic meaning and social and cultural contexts. This paper highlights a shift in meaning of the conception of contemporary art as a key element in intellectual culture, including politics, philosophy, science and other creative formats such as music and literature. Based on an analysis of the critical awareness of the various contributors to the magazine and on the historiographic study of certain aesthetic and symbolic questions, a review of the articles published in the Studies and Research section is detailed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the photographic series Baroque Biology Paper Theatre (2019), Jennifer Willet enages with GMO bacteria growing in LB Agar petri dishes. Each plate presents imaginary biological vignettes where non-human organisms teach humans complex biotechnological processes. In this work, living bacteria cultures serve as collaborators in the creative process creating artworks that are both sublime and disgusting. Baroque Biology (Paper Theatre) presents a series of biotechnological vignettes where I reimagine laboratory aesthetics as feminine, gawdy, and fantastical in direct contradiction to the norms of contemporary scientific practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Kirigami is the art of cutting paper to create three-dimensional figures for primarily aesthetic purposes. However, it can also modify the mechanical behavior of the resulting structure. In the literature, kirigami has been applied to modify the material's structural behavior, such as by changing its elasticity, rigidity, volume, or any other characteristic. This article examines the behavior of a pattern of rectangular kirigami cuts on a thermoplastic polyurethane soft material structure and its influence on the mechanical parameters of the macrostructure. The results demonstrate that rectangular kirigami patterns significantly affect the stiffness of the test specimens, changing from 1635 N/m to 4020 N/m. In elongation, there is a variation from 176.6% to 218% by simply altering the height of the rectangular cut. This enables the adjustment of the soft material structure's stiffness based on the geometry of the propagating kirigami cuts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is seen that studies on learning spaces in higher education institutions are very few in the literature. However, spaces have the power to affect behaviors and interactions with others. This study aims to determine the wishes of university students regarding the physical environment. For this purpose, it is planned to determine the missing things in the existing physical environment according to the "wish poems" of undergraduate students and their related wishes. Accordingly, the sample of the study consisted of 211 participants among the students of the faculty of education at a state university. In the study, for the purpose of revealing the views of the undergraduate students on the physical environment of their school, they were given a semi-structure, open-ended question format as "I wish there were … in my classroom/faculty/campus" and asked to write down 3 wishes regarding the physical environment. The obtained data were analyzed by using the content analysis method. In the study, different numbers of conceptual categories were reached under each sub-title with the method of coding and imaging. At the end of the study, 578 clear responses were obtained, and after examination, these responses were gathered under 35 conceptual categories in total. The categories about which the students had the most wishes were related to the furniture and equipment in their classrooms (f=51, 26.2%), social (f=33, 18.5%) and scientific (f=32, 17.9%) areas at the faculty and green spaces at the campus (f=61, 29.6%). Consequently, as pioneers of social and scientific change, it is important for universities to reevaluate their existing physical facilities based on the wishes of students in terms of feeding their innovative instincts. [This study was presented as a paper at the International School Principals Conference held in Istanbul.]

Management and maintenance of physical facilities are ladders for climbing and achieving quality assurance in Higher Education in the 21st Century. This paper reviewed literature on the management and maintenance of physical facilities for quality assurance in Higher Education in the 21st century with the aim of accessing its implication for the academic growth and sustainability of institutions. Significantly, the administration and maintenance of physical facilities in higher education are very important to the economic and academic growth of the educational system. They are ranked among the determining factors of success in the school system. This study looked at maintenance culture in tertiary schools, innovative methods of plant maintenance and renewal in higher education as well as the benefits of maintaining school physical facilities. It is important that the habit of maintaining existing physical facilities be learned by school heads and transferred to the subordinates and students as a sustaining force and vehicle for retaining equipment and facilities in their original condition of completeness and aesthetics.

This paper considers what decolonizing film education might mean through a series of research initiatives undertaken across different cultures which explore social media platforms for creating moving image sequences. The paper attends to three factors in the current climate of education: the accessibility of the medium, its immediacy in dissemination, and the democratizing effect that these conditions have had on the medium of film. Working with these three conditions in contemporary film education, the case studies described include workshops that aimed to shift the curriculum from film canons to proposing the introduction of concepts. Furthermore, elided histories are explored through site-specific projects that show how decolonial processes allow these histories to be reclaimed in film practice, and for marginal subjectivities to be made visible. Finally, the proposal of decolonial processes seeks to work with creating opportunities for social and historical visibilities. The proposition is to work with film(ed) evidence as material connected to broader social justice issues that are expressed through aesthetic forms closely associated with decolonial processes and described as decolonial aesthesis.

Gerard Leonard uncovers the living organic vision of Montessori scientific thought principles to ponder for our generation of Montessori: "To be ecoliterate is to understand the basic principles of ecology and to endeavor to live by them. Having a systems view of life, or what we would call in Montessori education, 'an understanding of the interdependencies in the natural and manmade worlds and between these worlds,' provides the framework within which the human values of justice, compassion, love, beauty, and peacemaking can be examined." [Paper presented at the NAMTA Conference (Cleveland, OH, Apr 20-22 2018)]