Category: Presentations and Talks

Join the Ulrich Museum of Art for a talk from Halsey Burgund, “How to Strand Astronauts on the Moon (and other artistic uses for AI),” starting at 6 p.m. Thursday, June 8 in the Beren Gallery at the Ulrich and via livestream. Attendees are also invited to a reception at 5:30 p.m.

Burgund is a new media artist and Emmy-winning interactive director whose work focuses on the combination of modern technologies — from mobile phones to artificial intelligence — with fundamentally human “technologies,” primarily language, music and the spoken voice.

The talk is part of the larger exhibition, In Event of Moon Disaster, a multi-media project created by directors Burgund and Francesca Panetta to illustrate the possibilities of deepfake technologies. They also offer a variety of resources to help the public understand and recognize the technologies involved.

The public events accompanying the exhibition are supported by the College of Engineering, Fairmount College, National Institute for Aviation Research (NIAR) and the Barton School.

The Ulrich Museum of Art will host an artist talk with HYBYCOZO, a collaborative installation art collective made up of Serge Beaulieu and Yelena Filipchuk at 6 p.m. Thursday, June 1 in Woolsey Hall. Their sculpture, Stratosphere, was the most recent piece to join the Martin H. Bush Outdoor Sculpture Collection in fall 2022. A reception is scheduled for 5:30 p.m.

HYBYCOZO’s work consists of larger-than-life sculptures that celebrate the inherent beauty of geometric form and pattern, and compose them in ways that harmonize the experience of sculpture, light and shadow. Much of their work draws on inspirations from mathematics, science and patterns in nature and acknowledges diverse cultural influences in pattern making and design. They seek to create public art that creates a sense of place and invites wonder and curiosity, not only about the elemental geometric forms used to compose their sculptures, but also in the technological processes used to create them.

Dalton Stanfield will speak as part of the Disaster Resilience Analytics Center (DRAC) seminar series from noon to 1 p.m. Friday, May 19 via Zoom. The presentation will late be available on the DRAC seminar series YouTube channel.

The talk, titled “Perspective, finding data in unusual places,” will draw upon the history of water on earth and man’s interaction with it. Examples to be discussed include; Florida, Houston, Lake Tulare and the Colorado River Basin. Each one of these case studies will be looked at for fundamental patterns, issues with past planning and how an ecologist could have predicted our current climate. From different perspectives we explore new ways to think about emergency situations and how perspective can lead us to effective but surprising solutions.

Stanfield grew up in Garden Plain, KS and then attended Wichita State, earning a bachelor’s in international business with a minor in economics and a bachelor’s in biological sciences with a minor in chemistry. He then attended Florida State university where he studied theoretical ecology and evolution and graduated with his master’s in ecology. Stanfield currently manages his own environmental consulting firm specializing on work with endangered species and the impacts of infrastructure projects.

The Department of Mechanical Engineering within the College of Engineering is hosting Dr. Tamas Molnar, a post-doctoral fellow from the California Institute for Technology, Pasadena, from 11 a.m. to noon Friday, May 5 in the 101K Engineering Building.

Molnar will present “Guaranteeing safe behavior for real-world control systems” to students, staff, faculty and industry partners.

Curious about Chat GPT, AI and machine learning and the impact they will have on the world? Attend presentations by two thought leaders in these areas. The National Institute for Research and Digital Transformation is pleased to welcome Dr. Monica Coley from Amazon Web Services and Andy Lin from Mark III to offer their perspectives and thoughts on this rapidly evolving technology.

• Coley, “AIML in a nutshell,” 11 a.m. Tuesday, May 2 in 142 Rhatigan Student Center, Harvest Room
  • Artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML) provide promise for advancing the practice of medicine and improving patient treatment and outcomes. Though the future of AI/ML yields optimism, excitement and a platform for innovation, challenges and concerns also exist around algorithm development, accuracy, implementation, adoption and trust within the industry. Coley will examine the key themes around AI/ML from both the context of the advantages of the innovation and its implications for the healthcare industry.
• Lin, “AI/ML & Simulation: State of the industry & practical tips for the next five years,” 9:30 a.m. Wednesday, May 3 in 265 Rhatigan Student Center, Lucas Room
  • Whether someone is focused on accelerating their research, building next-generation products and services in industry, or planning the next steps in their career, the impact of AI/ML, simulation, and the road to digital twins will touch almost everything done over the next decade. Come to this session to hear about how it got to this point with the steady rise of AI over the last decade, touch on the industry’s current “ChatGPT moment,” and ponder where to go from here. This session will also include some very practical tips on how to position an organization for the road ahead.

Wichita State students in 402U, “Instructional Strategies, Assessment and Management: Literacy Instruction for Upper Elementary,” instructed by Dr. Sun Young Lee, will showcase their research on how to integrate diversity through children’s literature in elementary classrooms from noon to 1 p.m. Monday, May 1 in 256 Rhatigan Student Center.

Learn about how future Shocker teachers are developing their pedagogical efforts to increase the representations of diverse student populations at “Diversity, #OwnVoices and Children’s Literature.” Light refreshments will be provided.

The presentation is co-sponsored by the School of Education and the Tilford Faculty Fellowship.

Pouya Jahanshahi is an Iranian-born graphic designer and scholar, currently an associate professor of graphic design and the coordinator of the MFA in graphic design program at Oklahoma State University. Jahanshai’s current exhibition, “Liminal Poetry,” is on display at the Clayton Staples Gallery on the second floor of the McKnight Art Center. He will give an artist talk at 12:30 p.m. Thursday, April 27 in 210 McKnight, with a reception following from 2 to 2:30 p.m. on the second floor of McKnight.

Pouya Jahanshai migrated from Tehran, Iran as a result of the Iran-Iraq War, first to London and then to Los Angeles. He earned his MA at California State University, Fullerton, with a focus on the “anatomy of a visual message” and the realm of semiotics. He received his MFA in graphic design and integrated media from the California Institute of the Arts, where he focused on the global development of what he as termed “hybrid visual cultures” — where cross-pollination of cultures has resulted in the birth of new visual realms.

While working with a broad range of cultural organizations and clientele, he is the co-founder of Pasaj Collaborative and Local-Not-Local art and design collaboratives, and his 20×20 Posters for Peace collection is currently being exhibited internationally. When time permits, he pursues his hobbies of Persian calligraphy, silkscreening and concrete poetry.

Join the Ulrich Museum of Art for the visiting scholar talk, “Yes, no, maybe so: Connections between Japanese prints, anime and manga and the stories we tell about them” by Andrea Horbinski at 6 p.m. Thursday, April 27 in the Beren Gallery at the Ulrich Museum. Participants are invited to a reception starting at 5:30 p.m.

Focusing on art and society in the 19th and 20th centuries, when Japan underwent a rapid, self-imposed transition to modernity, this talk examines not only the linkages between anime/manga and printmaking, but also the limits of those connections, and how the evidence for and against them has been deployed to serve larger stories about race, modernity and culture in the Asia-Pacific and worldwide.

The exhibition “Nature in the Floating World: Images of Nature in Japanese and Chinese Art” and associated programs including this one, are generously supported by Pam Bjork, Trish Higgins, and Shoko Kato Sevart, in loving memory of her mother, Taka Kato. The Ulrich is grateful for the ongoing support of Ulrich Friends with Benefits members who make the Museum’s exhibitions and programs possible through their memberships. The Ulrich also receives funding for general operational support from the City of Wichita and Wichita State.

Join the Department of Physics for its next seminar at 2 p.m. Wednesday, April 26 in 226 Jabara Hall and via Zoom.

The speaker for the seminar is Doga Kurkcuoglu, Fermilab Quantum Institute. He will present “Optimal Strategies for Quantum Simulations.”

Join the Department of Mathematics and Statistics for a public lecture by Dr. Keiko Kawamuro from the University of Iowa.

The lecture, titled “Diagrammatic left canonical form of braids and applications,” will take place at 3 p.m. Friday, April 28 in 372 Jabara Hall. Refreshments will be available at 2:30 p.m. in 353 Jabara Hall.