Resin Curtain: 2021 Gottesman Libraries Art Commission, funded through the Eugene E. Myers Trust.

It has been nine months since I have been away from the comfort of the Gottesman Libraries.

However, its memory is crystal clear in my mind as if I was studying there yesterday. One quality

that I appreciated about this space the most was its tall windows that allow a heavenly light inside. I would focus for hours on my work and then take a break, looking out from those windows usually to contemplate on a topic in psychology. It was a luxury to work near a beautiful natural light

source. That is my reason to highlight this quality of the Gottesman library in my installation

proposal. I believe this installation has to be something that honors the tall windows as artworks

that brings calmness into the library, and as an escape route for the ones who have a lot going on

in their minds. It should help a person's gaze to go from one place to another with interest. The

second quality that I would like to highlight is an artistic element in the Teachers College dining

hall. The round-stained glass pieces that embellish the windows there are beautiful, simplistic, and

similar-looking but different from each other. TC students used to appreciate it every day. I want

to carry this element to the beautifully lit spaces of the Gottesman Libraries by making a curtain

that consists of round transparent epoxy resin pieces. Each round piece will have a different

watercolor painting that I will collect for my Integrative Project (IP) until the end of January. I will

print the paintings on acetate paper and drown them in transparent epoxy resin. Once the resin

hardens it will be sturdier than a glass piece but with all its admirable qualities. I will link all these

pieces together with chains or a lighter material and hang them from the ceiling like a stained glass

curtain. This piece is not designed for viewing for a couple of minutes after reading the artist's

statement. It is a piece that will have an ethereal yet colorful presence that will catch the eye. The

students will not have to get up and lose their spot in the library to enjoy it. They can just use it as

a comma in between their thoughts while working or discussing the latest improvement in their

field.

Now that I have mentioned the physical inspiration for the installation I would like to dive into

the meaning behind the paintings. My Integrative Project is an exploration at the intersections

between psychology, education, technology, and art. It is such a niche intersection that I had to

create my Undergraduate Honor’s thesis and an art exhibition with my personal initiative. I

organized painting sessions with people with Parkinson’s disease to measure if the painting had

an impact on hand tremor. In my current project I will be using a rotating painting system that I

designed to research visual literacy online painting sessions within the context of art education

with 7th graders in Turkey. I hypothesize that the rotation motion lets the painter embrace the lack

of control over the painting process and to adopt an experimental approach. Over time, users tend

to notice that within chaos there can be order. Because they can create a beautiful abstract painting

two minutes, they can produce a whole collection in the three-day workshop that I will conduct in

mid-January. I hope to collect around two hundred round paintings from the students. Turning

these paintings into an installation will be the embodiment of a collaborative effort that symbolizes

the importance of embracing the ambiguity and the possibility of turning it into an asset. I believe

this can be a asset that will prove itself to be useful, as it is already accepted by the psychology

researchers under the term resilience, now in the middle of the pandemic, and in the future of these

children. For building and shipping the rotating platforms I spent two hundred dollars. To produce

two hundred resin circles, I will need 680oz resin, which will cost eight hundred dollars. This

installation will weigh 51 pounds, this will be distributed to chains that will cost around hundred

dollars. The total installation cost is nine hundred dollars. Including my flight and stay, the whole

installation would cost three thousand dollars. I will gift one painting kit to the library so that the

viewers can relax while making their own circular paintings to take home.