Daily News

posted on March 20: Media artist mixes unusual places with multimedia

Altering the usual relationship between artist and spectator in his new video, Museum Mile, Robert Hamilton - media artist and assistant professor of multimedia - has made thousands of New York gallery goers the subjects rather than appraisers of his work. Using a manic flip book technique, he has created a movie from countless digital photographs of visitors taken at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The recent award of a prestigious Canada Council research grant will allow Hamilton to explore the introduction of multimedia to unusual places and the overlap of the private and public domain further this summer. He plans an interactive project, using an ordinary house as the theatre of event, with passers-by triggering the projection of animated shadows onto the drawn curtains of the front window. Hamilton admits he is not entirely sure how the interactive project will develop or where it will end up. And that, he says, is the great thing about grants from bodies like the Canada Council and the Ontario Arts Council (from whom he's also received funding this year for a video project). "They allow artists time to focus on their craft, to make something really good. It's an exciting process." (The image is a still taken from Hamilton's video on Times Square.)

posted on March 19: Shattering myths about humanities students, careers

One of the enduring myths that permeates many university campuses revolves around the success students in various areas of study achieve in making rapid career transitions following graduation. Received wisdom would have it that students completing programs in disciplines such as commerce, engineering and nursing find it easiest to obtain employment. Not necessarily so. Humanities students will have an opportunity today (March 19) to participate in a forum that will help them appreciate the value employers put on their education. Representatives from various sectors will share their perspectives on the many transferable skills humanities students bring to the workplace and discuss how the current employment environment is evolving to the advantage of humanities graduates. The forum takes place from 5 to 7:30 p.m. in Togo Salmon Hall, Room 719. Representatives who will speak include David Wesley, president of Red Canoe Productions, Carolyn Reid, manager, City of Hamilton small business program and Lisa Kutcy, division leader, Primerica Financial Group. An August 2001 report reviewing the employment outcomes of university graduates shows that humanities students are among the most successful groups in finding work. The employment rates for humanities graduates six months after graduation (97.2 per cent) exceed those of all grads except those in medicine, rehabilitation sciences and education. Two years following graduation humanities graduates remain among the most employed. This event is co-sponsored by the McMaster Humanities Society, the Faculty of Humanities and the Career Planning and Employment Centre. (End of story)

posted on March 18: Chemistry professor awarded prestigious Killam fellowship

The interactions of silicones with the biological world will be the focus of McMaster's newest Killam research fellow. Chemistry professor Mike Brook is one of 17 researchers from across Canada to be awarded the prestigious research fellowship for 2002. Brook, who begins his two-year fellowship Jan. 1, 2003, said the fellowship will provide him with a resource that is always in short supply - time. "I will be able to do things I am not normally able to do, because of my teaching responsibilities and administrative duties," Brook said. "If you're trying to do something really different, you have to dedicate yourself to it."