Summer 2020 + THE LASTING LEGACY OF JULIAN T. WHITE + DIVERSE EXPERIENCES CONTENTS + FEATURES 06 THE LASTING LEGACY OF JULIAN T. WHITE 14 + Photo by Micah Viccinelli + “Nature vs. Nurture” by Chayse Sampy, Black Men in America series QUAD · LSU COLLEGE OF ART & DESIGN 24 WHY LSU ART & DESIGN? Tigers Share Why 02 LETTER FROM 26 I MADE THAT! THE DEAN Designing the Brain with Madelyn Riche 03 DID YOU KNOW? A Line in the Land, with 30 FIELD NOTES Kevin Benham Travel Snapshots 04 FOUR MINUTES ON . 32 CLASS NOTES Visualizing Genetic Relationships, Alumni News and Updates with Courtney Barr 36 EQUIPPED 18 FROM GREAT HEIGHTS For the Doctor of Design in Restoration Architect Elyse Marks Cultural Preservation CREDITS EDITORIAL DESIGN — GDSO PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR/WRITER ART DIRECTION PHOTOGRAPHERS Elizabeth Mariotti Luisa Restrepo Kevin Duffy Cover photo by Micah Viccinelli, CONTRIBUTORS FACULTY ADVISOR BFA candidate Courtney Barr, Associate Professor Lynne Baggett Kevin Benham, Assistant Professor Madelyn Riche, BID candidate DESIGN & ILLUSTRATION Erika Witt, DDES candidate Lindsey Henriques, BFA candidate Gabrielle Trupiano, BFA candidate COPY EDITOR Ellen Mathis SPRING/SUMMER ���� + Dean Alkis Tsolakis instructs students in the Design Paris program in France, fall 2019. Photo by Willie Goliday II, MArch candidate. Letter from the Dean This issue of the Quad explores the LSU College of Art & Design’s inherently question what is, and what could – rich history, and celebrates change – in our own institution of or what can – be. education, and in the fields of art and design. Meet some current students who are working to You will read about the life of Professor Julian T. White, the first change the worlds around them through their African American professor at Louisiana State University and craft, and find yourself inspired by alumni who the second licensed black architect in the state of Louisiana. The fearlessly embark upon less-tread-upon career following pages give a glimpse of the many lives that he touched, paths. They all show us how meaningful it is to as an educator and highly regarded member of the architectural be included in the classroom, on campus, and community. We honor him with the unveiling of the Julian T. in the chosen field of their dreams. White Atrium Mural, which celebrates his illustrious career. The College of Art & Design has been a leader in many ways, from welcoming diverse faculty, to adopting new technology, to challenging the status quo in art and design disciplines, which Alkis Tsolakis, Dean 2 QUAD · LSU COLLEGE OF ART & DESIGN Did You Know? WITH KEVIN BENHAM Kevin Benham holds the Jon Emerson/ installations that elucidate phenomena requiring Wayne Womack Design Professorship at careful observation through space and time. He the LSU Robert Reich School of Landscape has exhibited his conceptual work throughout the Architecture. His research and work focuses world, including exhibits at the Royal Institute on landscape phenomena and the temporal of British Architects, London, England; Zurich, qualities inherent in the discipline. To that Switzerland; and New Orleans, Louisiana. end, he produces temporal and ephemeral Q: What is the language of a line? A: A line in the land is one of the simplest of gestures, yet it is empowered with the capacity for meaning and significance. A line suggests the human act of possessing the land, claiming ground, and marking territory. A simple line + Broken Kilometer, traversing topography is also imbued with by Kevin Benham the possibility of travel, discovery, hope, and opportunity. It holds within it the memory of Mile Long Burn, a more recent temporal land art project with the past actions: as a recording of a physical act National Park Service in the Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve imprinted upon the surface of the earth. of Kansas, was conducted to maintain the health and vitality of endemic species in the prairie landscape. This particular In the past few years, my work has capitalized project, developed over a three-year period, consisted of a on the power of the line as a datum and mark controlled burn exactly a mile in length along the eastern edge in the landscape through simple interventions of the Tallgrass Prairie National Reserve. The burn was allowed of erasure that exploit the line as a temporal, to naturally extinguish itself as the fire came into contact with transitory phenomenon and as a catalyst natural fire-breaks, wet vegetation or gurgling streams. As a for advantageous ecosystem change. Broken result, the act of burning left an artifact of the natural processes Kilometer, a kilometer-long cut in the earth and forces that shaped the final work. The piece will continue near Harlösa, Sweden, completed in con- to evolve as the seedbed is exposed and new plant material junction with the EU project Sandlife and germinates and thrives. managed by the Swedish Fortifications Agency, acts simultaneously as land art and as a As my work and practice continues to evolve, I continue to think stimulus for increasing biodiversity in the about actions to disrupt ecologies as a means of diversifying area by exposing nutrient poor soils that the complexity of species in the landscape through the use of foster the growth of rare plant species, which unorthodox maintenance strategies that include the manipulation in turn attract extraordinary species of insects of soil surfaces, grazing, burning and other potential mechanical and birds. and natural means of alteration. SPRING/SUMMER ���� 3 Four Minutes On... VISUALIZING GENETIC RELATIONSHIPS WITH COURTNEY BARR We are familiar with textbook visualizations of scientific personal DNA sequencing has only been made information, most often represented through carefully labeled available to the general public in the past few diagrams and charts. We experience these diagrams in a scientific years; people can now utilize a variety of online context—their purpose is to explain purely factual information services to collect a DNA swab and learn about about biology, chemistry, physics, anatomy, and so forth. their genealogical connections, ethnic heritage, and genetic health risks. In fact, through DNA What if a visualization can provide more testing I was united with a relative who had than facts? What if it can provoke an emotional been adopted and never knew her biological reaction or be persuasive in some way? The family until now. answer to this question is where art and science converge. Due to public pressure, these online services have released previously inaccessible raw DNA Arguably the most widely recognized and significant scientific data to their customers. Individuals can now diagram of the last 100 years, Odile Crick’s drawing of the DNA download their raw DNA data, a spreadsheet of double helix structure stands out as one of the few that provokes more than 700,000 lines of chromosome base contemplation in a general audience. This elegant diagram pair positions of the human genotype. Without stimulates self-reflection and a deep curiosity in our human the assistance of a genetic consultant or analysis origins, and it is this kind of impact that I seek to achieve in my own service, this data is relatively meaningless to work. I create visual explanations that reveal insights and about the average user. However, when most see human relationships, such as intricate genealogical and genetic meaningless data, I see an opportunity. I began connections. My intent is to transform the scientific diagram into to explore how this dense information could be a creative visualization that crosses the bridge between science transformed into something both aesthetically and art; resonating beyond the scientific audience. fulfilling and informative. This line of inquiry grew from my long-term research into my Visualizing Genetic Relationships is a series own family genealogy. I have traced some of my ancestral lines of creative information displays that makes beyond the 1700s, while other ancestral lines come to a dead-end visual comparisons of genetic data between after one or two generations. To fill these gaps of information, individuals. I am currently working with the much of my research has been conducted using online genealogy DNA sequences of my own family members; communities such as Ancestry.com. Affordable and fast access to comparing my own sequence with that of my family members reveals where we share the “SciArt” community. The SciArt movement is propelled by genetic matches, offering a visual affirmation a growing community of artists that are inspired by scientific of a connection only visible on the molec- concepts. Organizations, art museums, and galleries that ular level. recognize the merit of science-inspired and data-driven art are growing in number and influence. One such entity, The SciArt To create this work, I had to develop a tool Initiative, is a New York-based group that produces SciArt for efficiently translating the thousands of Magazine and offers programs, grants, artist residencies, and characters in a text-based genetic sequence facilitates a community network for collaborations. In 2018 I had into color-coded symbols. I created a custom the opportunity to exhibit my work in a SciArt related exhibition color font called DNA Loops, which allows a at Northern Illinois University Art Museum. user to transform the base pairs A (Adenine), C (Cytosine), T (Thymine), and G (Guanine) into a In 2014, I began teaching a special topics course on information set of visually compelling graphic symbols. This design in the LSU School of Art. This interdisciplinary course tool facilitates experimentation with a variety of included junior, senior, and graduate level students from visual forms. The potential for this visualization graphic design, landscape architecture, and architecture. This method is exciting; I envision the possibility course was originally developed for graphic design majors, but of developing a system of DNA visualizations opening it to multiple areas gave me the opportunity to format that can be uniquely customized to the an interdisciplinary course that met the needs of students with individual, for a multitude of end-products, varying interests and creative goals.