2016 End Of Year Show

The Cooper Union 2016 End-of-Year show is a tradition at The Cooper Union and an event that many alumni return to see year after year. This year the show was held May 24 – June 12, 2016.  Students from all three schools participated.  The engineering exhibits included several team projects that included students from multiple years and disciplines and it included projects assembled by student organizations (AICHE, Cooper Motorsports, Sumo-Robots and ASCE Bridge Team). The School of Architecture had exhibits for each architecture year,

The Art and Architecture exhibits where displayed throughout the Foundation Building.  The Art exhibits were in the foyer area and multiple studio spaces on the 6th,  7th and 8th floors.  The Architecture exhibits were  om the 1st, 2nd and 3rd floors. The Engineering Exhibits were on the first floor of the Academic Building. Each of the three schools held an evening reception during the second week and many new 2016 alumni were at the receptions to present their projects. The Engineering Reception was held on June 1st, the Architecture Reception was held on June 7th, and the Art Reception was held on June 9th.  The stories here are a compilation of pieces written by several alumni.  We were unable to get the names of all the students who participated in the show and unable to fully label many of the photos which we regret.  If you know who some of the unlabeled works belong to, please send that information to us at contact@cooperalumni.org and we will make the update.

Link to 2016 EYOS Photo Gallery  Photos

Link to 2016 EYOS Architecture Photo Gallery Photos

Link to 2016 EYOS Engineering Site with video Eng-EYOS

Description of the Engineering Exhibits and June 1st Reception

by: Catherine Sanso and Mary Lynch.   Photos by: Catherine Sanso and Gary Kazin

The Engineering School held its End-of-Year Show from May 23 to June 12 on the first floor of the New Academic Building. The festivities were marked with students, parents, professors, and alumni gathering to observe the dedication and ingenuity on display.  The projects made use of  advanced engineering principles and many integrated principles from multiple disciplines like programming, construction, and architecture.  Each project demonstrated a way to solve a problem or improve upon an existing solution.

The Engineering School held a reception on June 1^st.  Approximately 60 parents and alumni attended.  Attendees were divided into 2 groups for the purpose of hearing the student presentations in rooms 104 and 101 during the first hour of the evening.  Everyone assembled in LL01 for the final presentations. Faculty assisting with the presentations included Dean Richard Stock, Yash Risbud EE 1992,Alan Wolf Eng 1978 and George Delagrammatikas.  Student presenters included Chris Curro EE’15, Jessica Marshal  ’17, Steve ?, Patrick, Kyle and Paul  (last 3 are freshmen students of Yash), Dolen Le EE’16, Eric Nguyen EE’16.

One project of interest was presented by Frank Longueira EE’16, and is titled Selective Hearing. Frank worked with his partners Gavin Kaplan and Matthew Smarsch (both EE ’16) to improve hearing aid performance in crowded environments like restaurants or bars. Currently, hearing aids don’t work well in busy environments because the aids tend to amplify all sound waves, rather than targeting the specific speech of an individual speaker and amplifying only that sound for the hearing-impaired user. By improving signal processing methods, the Cooper students aimed to isolate particular speech patterns and improve  hearing aid use in crowded environments. Frank, who was interviewed during the End-of-Year show, credits much of his success to his advisor (Professor Sam Keene), the support from his two partners in the project, and the Cooper Union curriculum for constantly challenging his limitations. Frank will continue at the Cooper Union to pursue his masters and he plans to continue improving this project.

Another project that gathered interest because of it’s simplicity and fun value was a lit display strip with digital readout that can be linked to a website of the user’s choosing to continuously scroll news or other items like weather, train delays, sports updates etc.  This project was presented by Dolen Le EE’16, Eric Nguyen EE’16.

The presentations in LL01 included a screening of the Cooper Motorsports video about the building and testing of the FSAE racecar. Alan Wolf gave a presentation about last summer’s Invention Factory which included videos. High School students participate in the Invention Factory. Last Year’s winner of the Invention Factory, Ruchi Patel, was in attendance.

Invention Factory Videos can be viewed at: InventionFactory.org The Student Chapter of the ASCE entered the annual bridge building contest sponsored by the ASCE and the American Steel Institute.  One of the bridge rules is that the bridge has to be built on site in only a handful of minutes using only hand tools and a limited number of students.  More points are given if fewer students are needed to assemble the bridge.  The Cooper Union team used only two students for the timed bridge assembly competition.  The recreated their award winning bridge assembling techniques during the June 1st reception.

The ASCE Bridge team includes: Zach Chang CE’16, Andrew Pena CE’18, Miles Barber CE’18, Jimmy Espinoza CE’17, Amos Chung CE’16, William Yang CE’19, Brian Phang CE’19 and Nina Berlow CE’19

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Additional photos available on the Cooper.edu Website Link to EOYS

Description of Art and Architecture Exhibits

by: Ariel Jackson, Photos: Ariel Jackson

In my review of the Cooper Union’s End of the Year show I started on the 7th floor of 30 Cooper Square where the “Art of the Book” class and the Foundation 2-D Design class have their class projects displayed in vitrines neatly placed in grid fashion. Laid out on a table are more examples of “Art of the Book” and Foundation 2-D Design projects as well as Antonia Stoyanovich’s Independent Study project “Blackout”, a collection of digital photos taken by the artist.

On the 6th floor lobby and inside the painting classroom paintings depicting various imagery–some more abstract than others–are hung on the walls while sculptural paintings are positioned around columns and placed on the floor and hung from the ceiling creating a maze of works. The art studios and painting classroom on the 6th floor are transformed into gallery spaces showcasing printmaking and painting. The printmaking works showcase a range of approaches from Senior Christian Noelle’s wall installation to more Senior Connor Perry’s more traditional print of what looks like a crashing wave.

Still on the 6th floor there are student-curated exhibitions split into several different rooms incorporating installation works, drawings, and sculptural works. In one room, the walls are painted green and in the space are various sculptures and paintings that together create a kind of installation of works that seem to be in conversation with each other either through topic or association. In another room an atmosphere has been created by use of paint and placement of flower pots. The space feels and looks like a loosely interpreted interior space with the dressing up of the room alongside works like Senior Atisha Fordyce collage installations incorporating floor patterns, drawing, and cut-outs.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Atisha Fordyce A‘16

Traditionally photography, video, graphic design, and animation are showcased on the 5th floor. In the lobby and down the hallway photographs are hung and placed on the floor to extend our understanding of photography as not just a 2-D experience. Behind the round elevator is a monitor showcasing video works on a loop and to its opposite is a pedestal with headphones for visitors to listen to a series of Projects in Sound Art. To your left are Graphic Design projects displayed in what is usually art studios. Sophomore and Junior projects depict chart and map designs while senior projects like Sarah Nakano Purgett’s poster series addresses identity politics. Walking down the hallway and into the Video classroom are a series of documentary, narrative, and animation videos screened via a projector encased behind a pane of glass. Just outside of the Video classroom on its own monitor is a video “In Our Own Hour”, a collaborative effort by several Seniors (Katie Pe Benito, Jakob Biernat, Andy Overton, Quinci Baker, Marina Daniel, and Andrew Rubin).

 

 

 

 

Still from In Our Own Hour

Also a tradition, the 4th floor is dedicated to sculpture and drawing works. A flag with the words “who will they take us for” sewn into it is hung and stretched in a corner by Andy Overton greets you before entering the 4th floor lobby where sculptures fill the space with some hung on walls and placed on the floor. The shop’s doors are closed to visitors but the art studios are open and filled with various sculptures including a room dedicated to foundation 3-D projects.

This year the School of Architecture has decided to spread out their impressive number of projects and diagrams on the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd floor in exchange for the School of Art to use the 7th and 8th floor. It is easy to be overwhelmed with the work that is presented by the School of Architecture but there is a system. On the 3rd floor 5th year thesis projects fill the lobby ranging from modest sized aerial displays of building to large prototypes displaying the focus of their thesis. For more information about each thesis there books created by each 5th year Architect student in the hallway. The projects of 3rd year Architecture students can also be found on the 3rd floor in rooms opposite the row of thesis books.

 

 

 

 

 

 

5th year thesis projects

On the 2nd floor lobby as well as the gallery space are 1st, 2nd, and Master Architect students works. In addition the hallway is lined with various models of structures using various materials such as wood and plaster to create sometimes sturdy and otherwise fragile models. At the end of the hallway are more works by the School of Art transforming additional art studios.  Last but not least on the 1st floor in the Colonnade are 4th year Architect student models that you can see while walking along the outside of The Cooper Union.

Across the street at 31 3rd Avenue as well as at 41 Cooper Gallery are two student curated shows. “Window Shopping” is a collaborative show by Kate Moger, Mateo Nava, Cyrus Blaze, and Sedrick Chisom which has been picked up and briefly written about in ArtNet news around the time of its opening. “Window Shopping” is located at the 31 2rd Avenue location which has been re-purposed from what used to be St. Mark’s Bookshop.  At 41 Cooper Gallery another student-curated exhibition takes place where larger sculptures and paintings are hung seemingly in conversation with each other. Scanning the room each work varies wildly differently from the piece near it in both content and medium. Upon entering the space you can’t help but notice two figures painted onto a shower curtain that blocks about ⅓ of the entrance. Behind a sofa sculpture that you can climb into the back are mixed media wall pieces next to paintings depicting what looks like a tabloid cover. Behind a dividing wall is a surprising sculpture of a puffer fish hung from its tale with a crayon hanging out of its mouth scribbling onto a coloring book.

Additional Photos: