I just found out another friend published a debut novel getting great reviews. Alex Kudera published Fight For Your Long Day, with four-and-a-half Amazon stars last I checked. Alex and I went to Central High School a year apart, in college competed against each other in Ultimate Frisbee (I think his team, Wesleyan, beat mine, Columbia, more often), and shared a room in Paris for a summer. Eventually we played[…] Keep reading →

Class at Parsons today was awesome and inspiring. The project due today — a linear zoetrope for each group, internally lit — was a big challenge. At the beginning of class a couple groups appeared to be having trouble — missed communications, etc. They grouped together, rallied, figured out what they could do during class, and, by the end, nearly every group was nearly finished. I expect each will be[…] Keep reading →

[This post is part of a series on creativity. If you don’t see a Table of Contents to the left, click here to view the series, where you’ll get more value than reading just this post.] Thinking outside the box is to think differently, unconventionally or from a new perspective. This phrase often refers to novel or creative thinking. Who wouldn’t want that, at least when the situation calls for[…] Keep reading →

The Parsons Class I’m co-teaching this semester has a blog. So far it just has a few pictures from the zoetropes a few students did. The results from that first assignment were incredible — tremendous variety of solutions to the various challenges of physical animation devices and animations: materials, sizes, quality versus quick and dirty, colors, contrast, motion, repetition, etc. I can’t wait to see the results of the later[…] Keep reading →

Joshua Spodek EDUCATION 2006 MBA, Columbia Business School New York 1999 PhD, Astrophysics, Columbia Graduate School of Arts and Sciences New York 1993-94 MA, Physics (Completed at Columbia), University of Pennsylvania School of Arts and Sciences Philadelphia 1993 BA, Physics, Columbia College New York 1991 L’Institut Brittanique, University of London Paris EXHIBITIONS 2017 The Museum of Math, Dance New York 2011-12 District 36, Elements New York 2011 Union Square Subway[…] Keep reading →

First, here is MTA Arts for Transit Page on Bryant Park in Motion (EDIT: Arts for Transit changed the page to one on Union Square in Motion) — created by me and four students and NYU’s Interactive Telecommunications Program:  Molly Schwartz, Igal Nassima, Brett Murphy, and Eyal Ohana. Below is an overview of the piece, starting from Bryant Park at the corner of 42nd and 6th, then entering the station[…] Keep reading →

My first big public art piece is up: Bryant Park in Motion, co-created with four students — Brett Murphy, Igal Nassima, Eyal Ohana, and Molly Schwartz — at the NYU Tisch School of the Arts Interactive Telecommunications Program (ITP), supported by MTA Arts for Transit and Submedia. The piece was created at no cost to the MTA. BPIM will be on display March 2010 at the base of the northeast[…] Keep reading →