Trevor Owens » public history

Scientists in Action: Front Door Iconography At The National Academy Of Sciences

Trevor — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 18:10:05 +0000

As I’ve mentioned before I have been looking at the Einstein memorial on the grounds of the National Academy of Sciences as a interesting spot to think about science in public. In working on the project I have been trying to find points of comparison, other statues of scientists or presentations of scientists, ideally in a similar setting like the National Mall. The first point of comparison to consider is the iconography on the National Academy’s building.

Just as the placement, posing and popularity of the Einstein statue suggest interesting points to explore perceptions of science the etchings on the door and reliefs along the side of the building make suggestions about what science is. I’m not entirely sure what to do with them yet but, they are so engaging that I thought I would share them, and some first thoughts.

Each of the panels below tries to distill a scientist’s work and achievements into a few icons and actions. Each panel is stunning, but I’m not sure about how successful they are in representing the scientist and their accomplishments. I suppose there is not much you can do in less then a square foot of space to commemorate a scientist. Below I have tried to extract the gist of what each pane suggests scientists do. What is your take on these? Oh, and does anyone have a clue about what the four little icons surrounding each pane are about?

Galileo Galilei 1564-1642

Setting: Outside
Action: Pointing
Tools: Holding, but not using a telescope

Issac Newton 1643-1727

Setting: Unclear
Tools: Scroll
Action: Unclear, Is he looking at calculations and charting the orbit of the planets? Is he flying a kite?
Extra: Science involves awesome capes

James Watt 1736-1819

Setting: Sitting by some huge gears
Action: Cranking gears and taking notes while other guy looks on
Tools: Lever, or some sort of super wrench

Charles Lyell 1797-1875

Setting: Pedestal suggests some sort of museum setting
Action: Looking at striations in strata
Tools: Magnifying glass

Charles Darwin 1809-1882

Setting: Museum? Clearly there are mammoth bones, but what is the tower all about?
Action: Reading, possibly dosing off, and potentially skull gazing
Tools: Book and a skull

Louis Pasteur 1822 – 1895

Setting: Labish alterzone with draped statue on a pedestal
Action: Looking at a test tube, resting an arm on books,
Tools: Testube, might be a Bunsen burner
Extra: Only panel to include a table

Euclid and Aristotle are also on the door, but it is a bit tougher to get a good shot of them because they are way up top.

All of these images come courtisy of Flickr user sethgaines

35 Views Of Einstein From 2100 C St. NW

Trevor — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 21:14:07 +0000

I’m working on a piece about the the Albert Einstein Memorial outside the National Academy of sciences. One of the facets I am exploring is the way in which the monument suggests photos to visitors. Many reviews of the monument on travel websites mention “photogenic” the monument is. Among other things it’s a place for formal pictures and a jungle gym for the kids to climb on. These are all CC licensed photos from Flickr. There are a bunch more, over 500 last time I searched, these are just some of my favorites, each of the thumbnails links back to the photographers pages on Flickr.

I think these photos have something to tell us about Einstein in popular culture and also some interesting comments on how monuments work. I have some ideas, but I am interested to hear other folks thoughts. What do you think about these photos? What can we learn from how people interact with, and photograph this monument?

Touching the National Mall

Trevor — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 23:18:09 +0000

I really like how you can tell just how frequently the Park’s services maps on the National mall are used by how worn the areas around the Lincoln Memorial and Washington monument have become. As you look at the worn spots around these two monuments you can picture the hundreds of thousands of tourists that touched their destination on these maps.