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NYU Prague Hosts American Astronaut Leroy Chiao

Posted on December 5, 2016, modified on December 8, 2016 by Lauren E Plusch

Leroy Chiao, an American astronaut who has spent 229 days in space on four separate missions, presented his newly-published book, Make the Most of Your OneOrbit, to a packed audience at NYU Prague in October. The book, published by Zdeněk Sklenář Gallery, with the cooperation of NASA and the Chinese Authority of Flights of People into Space, is a collection of photos taken by Mr. Chiao, selected from the more than 16,000 images he shot from the space station between 1994 and 2005.

Chiao first decided he wanted to become an astronaut at the age of eight, when he saw Apollo 11 land on the moon, and he wondered whether it was possible to capture an image of the Great Wall of China from space.

“One of the great myths is that the Great Wall of China is the only man made object that is visible from space; I spent a lot of time with my telephoto lens trying to take a photo of it,” he said. “I didn’t see the wall myself – I saw many lines in the mountains, but I couldn’t tell which was a wall, a road or a riverbed. I think I can say that no astronaut has identified the wall with his or her bare eye.”

Audience questions, not surprisingly, focused on what it was like to be in space. “The first time I flew into space, I thought I knew what to expect – I had seen movies, talked to astronauts- but the first time I looked at the earth from space was very emotional,” said Chiao. “The colors were much brighter than I expected – It made me feel wonderful, joyful. It also made me feel small.”

What about his thoughts on science fiction flicks? “I check my engineering hat at the door when I watch films about space,” he said. “There are a lot of technical errors, but some films do capture the visceral fear that all astronauts have – whether we admit it or not.”

Future of the space program

Mr. Chiao, who was on a White House committee to review NASA policy, also discussed his belief that international cooperation is crucial to further development of the space program with the international space station as a symbol of how countries can work together. “Whenever we have new astronauts come onto the space station, we greet them using a Russian tradition – giving them bread and salt,” he said. “But we use salt water so crystals floating around don’t get in our eyes.”

OneOrbit was first published in Czech and will soon come out in English and Chinese. The book was the brainchild of Czech gallery owner Zdenek Sklenar who befriended Mr. Chiao in 2009. The astronaut – who says he is an engineer, artist second – said that this book “brings together the universal values of art and rationality.”

“I was 20 yards from the Dalai Lama!”: NYU Prague students participate in the Forum 2000 Conference

Posted on December 2, 2016, modified on December 8, 2016 by Lauren E Plusch

October 2016 marked the 20th anniversary of the Forum 2000 Conference, founded by former Czech President Vaclav Havel to support the values of democracy, respect for human rights, assist the development of civil society, and encourage tolerance.

NYU Prague has long had close ties to Forum 2000, as Jiri Pehe, director of NYU Prague, was chair of the program committee for ten years, and many NYU Prague professors currently act as organizers and delegates in the program. Building upon these connections, NYU Prague students have the opportunity to participate in the conference, gaining access to world-renowned politicians, activists, academics and journalists. Students can also apply to intern for the Forum.

This year, NYU Prague students had the chance to hear His Holiness the Dalai Lama – Nobel Laureate and an exiled Tibetan spiritual leader – speak about compassion in world politics, as well as dozens of other world leaders discuss the conference topic: The courage to take responsibility.

Anand Balaji, a finance/economics major in Stern Business School, interned at this year’s Forum. “It was an incredible event that I never in my wildest dreams thought I would get access to as a sophomore in colleg,” said Balaji. As part of his responsibilities, Balaji reported on a panel about the philosophies of Havel and Gandhi, and also met Philip Zimbardo, psychologist and the leader of the Stanford Prison experiment.

Petr Mucha, professor of religious studies at NYU Prague, and member of the Forum 2000 program committee, invited his students to attend the Dalai Lama’s talk. Reilly Hilbert, a double major in religious studies (CAS) and acting (Tisch), shared her experience.

“We must make earnest of love and compassion in secular education. Not tying it to the next life, to heaven or hell, but to the present, with the understanding that harmonious living can only be achieved under compassion” —His Holiness the Dalai Lama

I am sitting in a white room in a very modern building, across the way from a very old building, on a small island in Prague. I am twenty minutes early and sweating because it’s not quite cold enough for my big coat, but too cold for my smaller one. I’m sitting in the second row, to my left is a political leader of a country of 46,000 discusses with two of his colleagues the reality of Trump’s systematic lies. To my right, a woman from India, hands folded, head down, mouth moving in what I think is a prayer. The Dalai Lama enters, everyone stands, and he shakes hands with people in the first row, and when he gets to my end, he sees the woman to my right and reaches out to her, over the bodies of the first row people. They exchange a few words, and she says, “Thank you for your blessing.” He waves at me, I smile and wave back, feeling both very big and very small at the same time. The woman next to me says, “He knows I’ve been praying for this.”

Praying for this. I am Catholic. I am a Catholic woman negotiating being also an artist, activist, actor, student, daughter, sister, friend and girlfriend in the 21st Century. It is painful, it is difficult, and I frequently find myself searching for truths in Religious Traditions that are not my own. In this way, the Dalai Lama let me down. His mission is Love, his mission is Compassion, Unity, and Togetherness. And where have I heard this before? In every homily, on every retreat, and in every meditative prayer I have had the opportunity to hear, see, and do. On every Krista Tippet On Being podcast, in every one of the numerous books that I’ve read about the potent experience of Religion—be it Catholicism, Judaism, Hinduism, Islam, or Buddhism, I have heard the same word: Love. And as I sat five feet from one of the Holiest men alive right now, I was disappointed to hear it again. Instead of feeling fulfilled and alive because of this ever present notion of love that surrounds me in everything I have been given the opportunity to do, I was sad that there wasn’t some magical new way of connecting to the world. As I continued listening to the other speakers, I worked to identify where this seemingly unfounded pain came from.

Tarek Osman, author of the popular book Egypt on the Brink, and another panelist in the conversation with His Holiness, helped me investigate this dissatisfaction. Osman said that “Religion can put forward order, but there is a very thin line between order and control.”

I remembered, while he was speaking, the model brought forth by Stephen Bush of religion as being essentially based in three things: power, meaning, and experience. The Dalai Lama’s notion of boundless love, compassion for all people, is all well and good, but Osman also grapples with negative aspects of the power religion has.

Catholicism for me has been very powerful, in both positive and negative ways, and it can be difficult to sort out. So the fact that love can seemingly be used however it best works for people does not fit in the binary that instilled love in me in the first place. If religion can be used as a tool to harm in the name of love, it can be placed in a binary “evil” category. But if religion is only a source of “light and love,” it might be “good” but it disregards the evils present in societies today that are carried out in the name of religion. This is where the unrest began to clarify itself.

The third panelist, Daniel Herman, the Czech Republic’s Minister of Culture, spoke about the crisis of modernization, explaining that post-Communism, he finally understood the Jewish Exodus. It took 40 years to renew, it took several generations to reestablish, and it was not only a physical renewal, but a moral one. He explained that the Czech Republic is only in year 26 of its own “Exodus,” and said that many societies today are in the middle of their desert.

In the United States, he added, Americans are still in their own desert, coming out of slavery, World War 2, Vietnam, and the women’s rights, civil rights, and gay rights movements.

And maybe that is why love is so difficult for me, because in my binary brain, love should be easy, natural, and something we can just do. But I know better than this. I know love is actually the most difficult thing in the world. It goes against the tendency to compete, to overcome, and to win. It goes against the tendency to control, to possess, and to know. Loving is not knowing. Loving is learning, it is hoping, it is working, and it is hard.

The Dalai Lama also said we need to be more active in love. We need to strive for teaching love in secular education, because love, though incredibly difficult, is a universal idea. And love is what will bring us out of our deserts. Not romantic love, not familial love, but a love for humanity that is so often forgotten in our world of immediate gratification and confusion.

The Dalai Lama said, “When I lived in isolation in Tibet, Buddhism seemed the only way, then I went to India.” There is not one right way to negotiate love. There is not one path. And this recognition of unity beyond objectivity is what can open us to love in all its difficulty. I’m praying for this.

I want to say thank you to Professor Mucha for giving me the opportunity to attend this conference, as Religious Studies is not only my major, but also very close to my heart, and so I feel grateful not only for the learning experience, but for the personal growth it helped me obtain.

Photos taken from the Forum 2000 website here.

Abu Dhabi Students Launch Math Education Program in Uganda

Posted on November 22, 2016 by Lauren E Plusch

Three students from NYU Abu Dhabi — one senior and two alumnae — have launched an education program in Africa designed to get resource-strapped teachers and students excited about mathematics.

REACH Uganda equips dozens of schools in central Uganda with essential math textbooks and provides teachers with inexpensive and creative teaching methodologies that will peak students’ interest and curiosity in math subjects.

Co-founder Clara Bicalho Maia Correia, NYUAD Class of 2016, said, “We were inspired to tackle the challenge of overcrowded classrooms and insufficient learning materials that many schools in Uganda reported facing. We came up with the idea while attending NYUAD together in early 2016 and traveled to Wakiso District to share our vision with local education officers and teachers,” including David Kafambe, their Uganda-based partner on the project.

REACH was awarded USD 15,000 by the D-Prize / NYU Reynolds Social Venture Competition, and NYU Green Grants to launch as a pilot program from August to December 2016. The annual D-Prize for New York University students around the world offers grants for student-led programs that provide proven poverty solutions in developing countries.

“We wanted to build a sustainable program that would have a tangible impact on education and promote curiosity,” added Eduardo Campillo, co-founder and current NYUAD senior. And it’s working. REACH has already delivered hundreds of textbooks to Grade 6 students in more than 30 primary schools in the Wakiso District. The goal is to distribute up to 1,500 textbooks in the region before the end of the year.

At the program launch celebration, Wakiso District Education Officer Lwanga Sempiija said, “This is a historic moment. Never before has a program brought together education officers, local leaders, teachers, parents, and students to tackle the issue of learning mathematics in schools in Uganda.”

“We hope this education program will improve student attendance, participation, performance, and attitudes toward the subject of math, and lessen the burden of overworked teachers,” said Angelina Micha Djaja, co-founder, NYUAD Class of 2016. A crucial part of the program involves engaging with teachers. The students from Abu Dhabi also led a two-day creative workshop with 16 local math teachers to help them develop new skills and knowledge that will improve student learning.

REACH Uganda is currently seeking additional funding to extend its pilot program into 2017.

By Andy Gregory, NYUAD Public Affairs

This post originally appeared on NYU Abu Dhabi’s Salaam blog and is available here.

NYU Madrid Site Director on Curating Joan Miró: Materiality and Metamorphosis

Posted on November 7, 2016, modified on November 3, 2016 by Lauren E Plusch

NYU Madrid Site Director, Rob Lubar, associate professor of fine arts at the Institute for Fine Arts and Director of the Joan Miró Chair at the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, has curated an exhibit on Miró in Oporto, Portugal. The exhibit, Joan Miró: Materiality and Metamorphosis, is on display at the Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art. We asked Professor Lubar for his thoughts on mounting the exhibition, and more broadly on Miró’s work.

When I was asked to curate the Portuguese State’s collection of 85 splendid works by the Catalan artist Joan Miró, I was delighted. I’ve dedicated a good part of my professional career to studying the art of Joan Miró. In 1988 I delivered my doctoral thesis at NYU’s Institute of Fine Arts on Miró’s early work. Since then, I’ve written extensively about Miró and am currently serving on the Board of Directors of the Fundació Joan Miró in Barcelona. I am also the Director of the Càtedra Miró at the Open University of Catalonia and the Research Director of the International Miró Research Group. The opportunity to curate the Oporto exhibition at the Serralves Museum, and to write a catalogue, has been one of the great pleasures of my academic career.

The collection, which contains a number of major works of historical importance and is uniformly of high quality, was acquired by the Portuguese State in an unusual way. The 85 works were purchased by a Portuguese bank as an investment opportunity. When the bank failed, it was rescued by the Portuguese State, to which the collection passed. Two and a half years ago, under a different government, the Portuguese State attempted to auction the collection at Christie’s London. There was a huge public outcry in Portugal and the collection was withdrawn from sale. At that time, I had been invited to deliver a plenary lecture before the sale. I was deeply disturbed that a collection of such great cultural value was being sold, as the decision struck me as politically driven. Fortunately, with the controversy that followed, the collection remained in Portugal but a final disposition for it was not made until recently. The current government decided to show the collection publicly in Portugal for the first time, and I was brought on board as curator. Not only is the exhibition at the Serralves Museum a huge success, but it was announced at the inauguration, in the presence of the Prime Minister of Portugal, the President of Portugal, the President of Spain, the President of Catalonia, the Mayor of Oporto and various Ministers of Culture that the collection would remain in Portugal and would find a permanent home in the Serralves Museum.

To have had the privilege to work with this great collection and to have had a hand in establishing a new museum in the magnificent city of Oporto has been enormously satisfying. With the Fundació Joan Miró in Barcelona and the Fundació Pilar i Joan Miró in Palma de Mallorca, the Serralves Miró collection forms a cultural triangle in the territories of the Iberian Peninsula. There will be numerous opportunities in the future for collaboration among these and other institutions, and I look forward to a close working relationship with the curators and administrators of the Serralves Museum.

About the Exhibition

Joan Miró: Materiality and Metamorphosis, which is on display through January 28, 2017, is comprised of 85 works by Miró owned by the Portuguese state, many of which have never been seen before by the general public, including six of his paintings on masonite produced in 1936 and six “sobreteixims” (tapestries) of 1973.

Robert Lubar discussing Miro with the President of Portugal, the Prime Minister of Portugal, and the Prime Minister of Spain at the exhibit opening in September.

The exhibition covers six-decades period – from 1924 to 1981, though it focused on the transformation of pictorial languages that the Catalan artist first developed in the mid-1920s. The exhibition considers his artistic metamorphoses across the mediums of drawing, painting, collage and work in tapestry.

Miró’s visual thinking and the ways in which he negotiates between optical and tactile modes of sensation is examined in detail, as are the artist’s working processes.

http://www.serralves.pt/en/activities/joan-miro-materiality-and-metamorphosis/

NYU DC Students Experience Travelers from the Lands of the Epic of Gilgamesh at the Italian Embassy in Washington, DC

Posted on November 3, 2016, modified on November 3, 2016 by Lauren E Plusch

First-year students in NYU Washington DC’s Cultural Foundations class had the opportunity to join Professor Alexander Nagel for a special opening of an exhibition of photographs documenting heritage preservation in Iraq at the Italian Embassy last month.

Dr. Carlo Lippolis, of the University of Turin in Italy and President of Centro Ricerche Archeologiche e Scavi di Torino (CRAST), visiting NYUDC class the day after the exhibition.

Dr. Carlo Lippolis, of the University of Turin in Italy and President of Centro Ricerche Archeologiche e Scavi di Torino (CRAST), visiting the NYUDC Cultural Foundations class.

To commemorate the opening, Dr. Carlo Lippolis, of the University of Turin in Italy and President of Centro Ricerche Archeologiche e Scavi di Torino (CRAST), presented Heritage in Danger: The Centro Scavi Torino and the Preservation of Iraqi Cultural Heritage, which highlights the work of the Center over the last ten years. Following the presentation, Dr. Lippolis visited the Cultural Foundations class for an additional discussion and question and answer session.

The following are reflections on the event and on Dr. Lippoli’s visit from NYUDC students.

Dr. Lippolis first introduced the Iraqi Italian collaboration efforts in rebuilding the displays of the National Museum of Iraq in Baghdad. Preserving collections from ancient Sumerian, Babylonian, Akkadian and Assyrian and Islamic civilizations, the museum holds objects from Uruk, a city the class just learnt about, while discussing cuneiform tablets and reading the fascinating stories from *The Epic of Gilgamesh* which was written over 3,000 years ago. Unfortunately, in April 2003, many precious artifacts were looted from the museum, and is a window to the past of Mesopotamia and human history. Despite the difficult political situation in Iraq, efforts to reopen the National Museum began in 2006. The Iraqi Italian teams cleaned and repaired artifacts, redesigned the galleries, created a timeline, and reinstalled the museum lighting. The museum was officially reopened to the public in February 2015. When Dr. Lippolis saw children lined up and eager to visit the museum, how they absorbed knowledge from the displays, and smiling at each other, he felt all of his team’s effort worth it.

Dr. Lippolis also introduced the audience to the reopening of the Iraqi-Italian Institutes in Baghdad earlier this year, in April 2016. Originally founded in 1969, the work of the Institute was halted during the Second Gulf War. He explained the mission of the Iraqi-Italian Institutes as to provide full cooperation on all issues raised by the Iraqi side, but especially to contribute to the safeguarding of the cultural heritage. After a retrieval of a historical building close to the Qislah, the old Turkish military quarters, the Institutes reopened with the purpose of contributing to the progressively wide-ranging safeguarding of the Iraqi cultural heritage and new archaeological and scientific research. He also spoke about his own excavations in Iraq. While there were Italian excavations at a site of named Seleucia earlier, since 2012 an Italian archaeological expedition began working in south-eastern Iraq on the site of Tulul al Baqarat. Altogether, it was great to gain so much insight into the work of European archaeologists in Iraq.

Jin Xiangru, Freshmen, NYU DC, Course “Cultural Foundations 1”

On the next afternoon, Dr. Lippolis joined us in the classroom at NYU DC. Here, we had the opportunity to learn more about the Italian and Iraqi collaborations, and we were able to ask questions about the practices of his work in Iraq. In his lecture on Wednesday evening, Dr. Lippolis had already introduced the efforts and work that went into the reopening of the Iraq Museum, and how the 2003 looting and the Iraq War halted archaeological research in Iraq. Dr. Lippolis continued to discuss how the damage and looting of sites has a lasting impact on the history of people. Some looted artifacts were returned to the museum in Baghdad by locals soon after the events happened in Baghdad. However, the museum curators were not able to verify all thefts, because archival documentation was destroyed along with some of the artifacts being looted. The 2003 looting had not only an impact on the artifacts that were damaged, but also on decades of research conducted. Dr. Lippolis introduced us to the history of the Iraq Museum and shared fascinating letters written by Gertrude Bell, the Iraq Museum founder. During her time, few women had access to education: against all odds, she got her education, and for the rest of her life she did not stop pursuing archaeology. After her death, the Iraq Museum changed locations, but they held on to her spirit for archaeology, and a sign with her name can be found by the Museum until this day. I was personally captivated by the diplomatic efforts and politics behind the reopening of the Iraq Museum in 2015. We learned about the work that went into planning of the layout, and the challenges in conserving and moving the sometimes very fragile artifacts.

My classmates and I were interested to learn more about the politics of archaeology. We wanted to know how embassies, diplomats, countries, and archaeologists co-operate with each other, about the work in recovering lost and looted pieces. Organizations such as Interpol monitor activities involved in the sale of looted objects yet the rise of the internet (and especially the dark net, as one student pointed out), presents new challenges and opportunities. This looting is a shame because history is being destroyed by greed. This practice should be outlawed. I can see where this behavior comes from, for since mankind started conquering other cultures, their first instinct was always to rob and destroy a culture. Culture unlike people changes and needs to be recorded before it is gone. The Iraqi locals that returned the stolen artifact set a great example of humanity and I became curious to learn more about Iraq.

My mother is from Vietnam and I was born in the Czech Republic. I spent most of my life outside of Vietnam, and I only had a few chances to interact with Vietnamese culture. Growing up I did not have too much of an interest in the country my parents grew up in, but it is something I regret now. I believe that preserving culture and history is important, so future generations will not have similar regrets as I did. The meeting with Dr. Lippolis provided me with important insights into understanding my own culture, because sympathy is the bridge to peace.

Thao Huong Tran, New York University, Washington, DC, Course “Cultural Foundations 1”

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