UCSC OpenLab: Art + Science Research Center
OpenLab is a Research Center at the University of California, Santa Cruz, founded by professors Jennifer Parker and Enrico Rameriz-Ruiz. The Center targets complex education issues of national significance regarding the ability of art and science researchers to collaborate on research endeavors. The goal of the OpenLab is to help change the current status by providing shared research facilities and create a network for collaborative discourse fueled by academic communities, arts and science communities, and industry.
OpenLab has been pursuing the physical development of new collaborative laboratories as spaces to foster this research and establish networking systems for faculty and students to create projects. Laboratories and studios in both the arts and the sciences are accessible to users in the OpenLab Network. Within this immersive environment, we conduct research to acquire skills and knowledge that crosses disciplinary boundaries between science, education, and the arts while sharing expertise in collaborative research methodologies.
Jennifer Parker, director of OpenLab, will discuss educational models for art and science inquiry as a case study for project-based research rooted in higher education.
Art Department Chair and Founding Director OpenLab
University of California Santa Cruz
Jennifer Parker is associate professor and chair of the Art Department at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Parker is the founding director of the UCSC OpenLab Research Center and serves as faculty for the Digital Arts & New Media (DANM) program. She has been running the DANM Mechatronics collaborative research cohort since 2009, developing research projects that combine art, design, science, and technology. Her work has been presented nationally and internationally. She is the recipient of several grants, awards, and fellowships including Artworks NEA, Art Matters, the New Forms Regional Grant administered by the Inter-Arts Program of the NEA, the New Jersey State Council of the Arts, and the Kate Neal Kinely Memorial Fellowship Award.
