Faculty + Staff:
Participants:
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Professor Victoria Vesna, Ph.D. - Art | Sci Center Director
Victoria Vesna is a media artist, professor at the department of Design | Media Arts at the UCLA School of the Arts. She is also director of the recently established UCLA Art|Sci center and the UC Digital Arts Research Network. Her work can be defined as experimental creative research that resides between disciplines and technologies. She explores how communication technologies affect collective behavior and how perceptions of identity shift in relation to scientific innovation. Victoria has exhibited her work in 18 solo exhibitions, over 70 group shows, published 20+ papers and gave a 100+ invited talks in the last decade. She is recipient of many grants, commissions and awards, including the Oscar Signorini award for best net artwork in 1998 and the Cine Golden Eagle for best scientific documentary in 1986. She holds a PhD from the University of Wales, UK and is he North American editor of AI & Society and author of Database Aesthetics.
Adam Stieg, Ph.D, Scientific Director, California NanoSystems Institute 
Adam Stieg serves as the Scientific Director for the Art | Science Lab. Originally raised in the suburbs of Chicago, Adam received his B.A. from Drew University and Ph.D. in Physical-Inorganic Chemistry from UCLA where he continues to carry out nanoscience research as the Technical Director of Nano and Pico Characterization at the California NanoSystems Institute. This research is focused on the development and application of new experimental methods, specifically in the field of scanning probe microscopy, toward development of an integrated understanding of matter at the interfaces of traditionally defined boundaries. His direct involvement in a variety of collaborative, interdisciplinary research projects between the arts and sciences has provided both inspiration and motivation for bringing the power of such creative approaches to the forefront of education.
John Carpenter 
John Carpenter is a graduate student in the Department of Design | Media Arts in the School of the Arts and Architecture at UCLA. He works on biological data visualization and his current focus is virtually and physically modeling objects in motion through time and space. John graduated from the University of Arizona in 2001 with a B.S. in Molecular and Cellular Biology and minors in Studio Art and Psychology. He then worked with Dr. Scott Fraser, david kremers, and Wayne Waller in the Biological and Brain Imaging Centers at the California Institute of Technology(2001-2005). Following his research at Caltech, John worked at Morphosis Architects (2005-2007) and collaborated with designers to develop new visualizations for 3D program elements and conceptual systems.
Lis Evans 
Lis holds a B.S. in architecture and a minor in neuroscience from MIT. Prior to pursuing a masters in architecture at UCLA, she gained a diverse background in design and research while working at several architecture firms, editing for an architectural book publishing house, and design writing for a San Francisco based magazine. She is particularly interested in how design can be used to further humanitarian causes.
Haider Rasool 
Haider is a graduate student in Professor James K. Gimzewski’s research group in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry. He became interested in collaborative efforts of the Art | Science center through his interactions with Professor Gimzewski and close collaborator Professor Victoria Vesna. He is particularly interested in how current visual and audio art work relates to current emerging scientific technologies. His research project involves the development and prototyping of novel atomic force microscopes with the primary goal of increasing image resolution and acquisition speed. The ultimate hope of the project is to be able to observe biological systems with greater detail to understand how fundamental chemical interactions dictate global cellular response.
Tyler Adams 
Tyler Adams is an artist and educator. His work explores various aspects of perception and sensation, in particular the ways in which technologies extend or shape our senses and consequently alter our understanding of ourselves and our environment. Tyler holds an MFA in Design | Media Arts from UCLA , a BFA from California Institute of the Arts, and a Post-Baccalaureate in Computer Science from Brandeis University. He is currently a Lecturer at Loyola Marymount University in the Department of Art and Art History.
Carlin Hsueh 
Carlin (pronounced Carlene) will be a third year graduate student at the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry. She hails from our own southern California area but spent four wonderful years up at Berkeley for her undergraduate career. She currently works in the Gimzewski group in the physical chemistry division working on AFM imaging of in situ cleavage of DNA for gene expression profiling. She hopes that the results of this study will have a promising application as an alternative approach to development of predictive, preventive and personalized medicine. Before attending graduate school, Carlin spent some time teaching both eager and reluctant high school students the joys of chemistry. She enjoyed getting to know her students and sharing how chemistry can be used and seen in their every day lives. Carlin herself is fascinated with merging both the artistic and practical perspectives of chemistry and looks forward to sharing that experience.
Paul Wilkinson 
Paul is a research paper assistant and Ph.D. candidate in the Gimzewski research group within the Chemistry Department at UCLA. Over the past several years he has conducted research involving cells and focused ultrasound, a polymer-based electronic nose, and the interaction of light with micro-scale materials. In addition to the scientific research in the lab, he also contributed to collaborative multimedia art projects directed by Victoria Vesna and Jim Gimzewski, including Blue Morph and Water Bowls. Paul is also fascinated by the various sounds of chemistry, biology, physics, and mathematics that can be discovered by converting data and equations into soundscapes.
Stefanie Adcock, Assistant Director, Art | Sci Center 
Stefanie Adcock is a dance theatre artist, educator, experimental filmmaker/collaborator and is currently working under the direction of Victoria Vesna at UCLA’s Art | Sci Center. Adcock completed her undergraduate studies at the University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa in Dance and Asian Studies. After completing three years in Japan, Adcock returned to the United States obtaining an M.F.A. at UCLA’s Department of World Arts and Cultures. Adcock’s work draws from Japanese movement aesthetics, Polish avant-garde theatre and an interest in the art of the moving image. Her work has been presented at Kobe Hall, the Kennedy Center, UCLA, Highways Performance Space, the Stella Adler Theatre, VideoDance 2007 in Athens, Greece and SUNY Potsdam. Adcock’s current artistic research and work experiments with cultivated microbes as scenographic elements for an original claymation film exploring the aesthetics of disease, body and decay.
Alan Wood 
Alan Wood is a technologist at the UCLA Design|Media Arts Department. He is primarily interested in the science and application of computation and data, open source software, and mathematics. Prior to joining UCLA in 2001 Alan spent four years at the MIT Center for Space Research working on NASA's Rossi X-Ray Timinig Explorer. He holds a B.S. in Mathematics from Worcester Polytechnic Institute with a minor in Computer Science.
Dougal Henken - Counselor 
Dougal Henken has a very young career. He began exploring the arts early in high school, experimenting in video and sound design. After graduating from Brewtser High School in 2007, Dougal went on to study new media in the Design/Media Arts Department of UCLA, where he is now a Sophomore. In his spare time, Dougal enjoys making electronic music and long boarding.
Tara Zepel 
Tara Zepel is an Art | Science student, researcher, and advocate. Her primary interests include the cultural perception of emergent technology, innovation artistic applications, and blurring the dichotomy between academic disciplines, theory, and practice. Tara graduated from Duke University in 2004 with a BA in Literature where she worked closely with the Nasher Museum and university administration to blend the arts and sciences. Currently, she works as a project manager at a Los Angeles art gallery and under Victoria Vesna at the UCLA's Art | Sci Center. This fall, she will attend UCSD to pursue a PhD in Art History and Computing in the Arts.