November 2020 Archives

November 17, 2020

Treasures from the Yale Film Archive: IMPASSE by Frank and Caroline Mouris

Join Treasures from the Yale Film Archive online for a conversation with animators Caroline and Frank Mouris ART '69, in conjunction with the online debut of their recently-preserved short film Impasse (1978), which was created using millions of Avery labels. In the film, a red arrow and a white dot travel through tessellating layers of shapes and colors, set to a soundtrack by percussionist Roland Miles. The film was preserved in 2020 thanks to a collaborative effort between the Academy Film Archive and the Yale Film Archive, who each provided original film and audio elements to enable the preservation of the film.

In a conversation recorded in November, 2020, the Mourises speak with Yale's film archivist Brian Meacham about the origin of the film, their connection with Avery through designer Saul Bass, and how the painstaking work was performed by their small animation studio.

Watch Impasse (10 mins)

Watch the Filmmaker Conversation (25 mins)

What is Treasures from the Yale Film Archive?
Treasures from the Yale Film Archive is an ongoing series of classic and contemporary films in 35mm curated by the Yale Film Study Center and screened at the Whitney Humanities Center.

Post on November 17, 2020 - 8:50am |

November 11, 2020

Nov. 12, Sterling Library: Students are invited to write postcards for the University Archives

overlapping postcards with images and text

What would you like future students to know about being a Yale student in 2020, post-election? 

On Thursday, Nov. 12, students are invited to stop by Sterling Library between noon and 3 pm to write their answers on a postcards that will be preserved in the Yale University Archives. Students may also choose to share any aspect of their student experience this year. More than 200 student responded to a similar invitation last month with poignant reflections on their studies, life in the residential colleges, and the impact of the coronavirus on families and friends. Students may also submit comments online via the library's Help Us Make History website. 

The opportunity for students to share their feelings and experiences is part of a larger effort by the library's Manuscripts and Archives department to document the student experience during the pandemic. Last month, when the library offered students a similar opportunity, students fanned out across the plaza in front of Sterling to scribble answers, packed with emotion, including poignant comments like these: 

  • “Life is miserable, my parents are unemployed, and this recession is horrible. School is hard but I think life will get better.”
  • “COVID has been really hard socially, especially in a college environment in which I used to go to parties and eat a different meal at a different dining hall with a different friend every day... The politicized environment has been really scary, and I’m scared for the future.”
  • “I miss the random small-talk before/after lecture and bumping into people on the street (and being able to see their entire face without a mask!) Yale has been keeping COVID cases very low, though, so I feel very lucky to be able to be on campus, with my friends, in person.”

As they left the October event, appreciative students scooped up giveaways of Yale Library totebags and collection-themed coloring pages—but they seemed even more grateful for the opportunity to process their experiences so far this year, including how to maintain a sense of community within the constraints of the pandemic.

“For many of us, it was a really hard decision to come back and we’ve been wondering whether our decision to be here was the right one,” one student said. “This event makes me feel like I did the right thing. It makes me feel like we’re all in this together.”

-- Tricia Carey 

 

Post on November 11, 2020 - 5:28pm |

November 7, 2020

“Mapping spatial inequity” is the theme of GISday virtual conference on Nov. 13

Jennfer Chenoweth head shot

Registration is open for Yale’s 2020 GISday Virtual Conference, Mapping Spatial Inequity, to take place from 11:30 am to 4 pm on Friday, Nov. 13. Interested members of the public, as well as the Yale community, are welcome.

“Spatial inequity” refers to the unequal distribution of resources and services based on location—a burgeoning area of inquiry made possible by the development of increasingly powerful geographic information systems.  

“GIS is not just software but also people and data that provide a different lens by adding location and proximity to the community matters that we should analyze,” said Miriam Olivares, GIS Librarian at Yale Library’s  Marx Science and Social Science Library. “GIS opens a powerful window of information to the world, by showing new patterns.”

The keynote speakers will be Jennifer Chenoweth, an artist who maps where people experience different emotions, and Dexter Locke, a geographer and social science researcher with the USDA Forest Service.

Locke, whose research interests include urban and community forestry, received a master’s degree from the Yale School of the Environment before earning his PhD in geography from Clark University.

Chenoweth, the lead artist of Fisterra Studio Project in Austin, Texas, is a contemporary artist who has worked in many different media. Among her best known works is the XYZ Atlas, an interactive project that seeks to map the experience of belonging. Her keynote topic is: What we share in our common humanity.

Barbara Rockenbach, Stephen F. Gates ’68 University Librarian, will give the conference opening remarks.  GISday is sponsored by Yale Library, the School of the Environment, and the Yale Center for Earth Observation. See the full program and registration link at gisday.yale.edu.

Post on November 7, 2020 - 12:38pm |