Carnegie Mellon University
March 14, 2012

Press Release: Carnegie Mellon Presents Jill Watson Festival Across the Arts April 12-14

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Contact: Teresa Thomas / 412-268-2900 / thomas@cmu.edu

PITTSBURGH—Amazing transformations from humble beginnings is the theme of this year's Jill Watson Festival Across the Arts at Carnegie Mellon University.

wats:ON? 2012: TRANSFORMER, held in honor of Jill Watson, a Carnegie Mellon alumna, adjunct faculty member and acclaimed architect who died on the TWA Flight 800 crash on July 1996, will be held April 12-14 at CMU's College of Fine Arts (CFA). Events begin at 5 p.m., Thursday, April 12 with a lecture and demonstration by Leah Buechley, director of the High-Low Tech Research Group and a professor in the MIT Media Lab, in Baker Hall A51.

Other festival highlights include a 5 p.m., Friday, April 13 talk and demonstration in the STUDIO of Creative Inquiry, CFA 111, by Addie Wagenknect and Stefan Hechenberger of Nordt Labs, and an 8 p.m. interactive rhythmic event in Alumni Concert Hall, featuring a body music performance with Keith Terry, director of the Crosspulse Project and the International Body Music Festival.

Events on Saturday, April 14, include a series of workshops from 2 to 5 p.m., featuring a Lasersaur Workshop with Nortd Labs, Paper Airplanes with Ben Saks, and Hacking Objects with Nina Barbuto in the STUDIO for Creative Inquiry. At 6 p.m. in the STUDIO, there will be a reception and artists talk with Wade Kavanaugh and Stephen B. Nguyen, creators of 'Tug O' War,' a large-scale paper installation in the CFA Great Hall. Kavanaugh and Nguyen have exhibited their work at the Dumbo Arts Center, the Maproom, Islip Art Museum, The Soap Factory, and Mass MOCA; 'Tug O' War' will remain on display through April 27.

The festival's curators are Assistant Professor Pablo Garcia, the Lucian & Rita Caste Chair in Architecture, and Spike Wolff, an adjunct assistant professor of architecture.

For more information, visit http://www.cmu.edu/architecture/lecture/watson-festival/index.html.

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