“If
you go down to the woods today you’re sure of a big surprise!” No,
we can’t guarantee
you that, but we do know there will be a 300-ton bear on campus next
year. Artist Tim Hawkinson, commissioned by the Stuart Collection’s
Mary Beebe, will create the 23-foot high bear for the new Academic
Courtyard at UCSD’s Jacobs School of Engineering. The bear’s eight enormous granite rocks were
transported from a quarry at the Pala Band of Mission Indians Reservation
North of
San Diego to UCSD’s Camp Elliott field station in January.
The rocks were scanned and professor Mike Bailey and his team at
the
Supercomputer’s visualization lab used the
digital information to fabricate 1-in-12 scale models
on one of their rapid processing machines. Hawkinson then worked
with these “rocks” to construct the above model of the
final installation.
Project manager Mathieu
Gregoire says the real bear will be constructed on campus in January
2005. A major survey of Hawkinson’s work will coincidentally
open at the Whitney Museum in New York at the same time. But if
you can’t make it to the big apple, just come on down and
picnic with our bear on campus! |
