Categorically Not! – Bubbles

The next Categorically Not! is on Sunday September 14th. It’s the start of the new season! The Categorically Not! series of events that are held at the Santa Monica Art Studios, (with occasional exceptions). It’s a series – started and run by science writer K. C. Cole – of fun and informative conversations deliberately ignoring the traditional boundaries between art, science, humanities, and other subjects. I strongly encourage you to come to them if you’re in the area. Here is the website that describes past ones, and upcoming ones. See also the links at the end of the post for some announcements and descriptions (and even video) of previous events. (Image on left is of artist and musician Libby Lavella, in her presentation about ambiguity in art and music during the June 8th 2008 event.)

The theme this month is Bubbles. Here’s the description from K C Cole:

Bubble wrap or soap suds; champagne or soda pop; breakers or bread; all are built on bubbles. So, in a sense, are we—for any egg or seed is a kind of bubble enclosing a new life, and every cell in our bodies is a permeable membrane (a bubble) chock full of complicated molecular machinery that makes us go. Galaxies drape across the sky in what appear to be cosmic-scale bubbles; our universe may be one bubble among many, ever bubbling out of the void. Financial bubbles can wreck havoc with markets, while soap bubbles make almost everyone smile, and all of us, one way or the other, walk through life in self-created bubbles of our own.

(Image: Bruce Tyson, Perrin Chiles, and Sterling Johnson.)

For our September 14th Categorically not, Bruce Tyson, President of the investment advisory firm Weston Capital Management, Inc., will tell us how identifying financial bubbles is critical to the investment process. Over the past year, the biggest bubble in generations has burst, and Bruce will talk about the disparate forces that came together to create the recent crisis as well as examine some basic elements usually present at bubble formation. Financial bubbles have a long history, and he’ll share thoughts on the subject by the Russian novelist Nicolai Gogol.

A bone fide “bubbleologist,” Sterling Johnson is a lawyer, former engineer, and bubble fanatic since JFK was president who believes that few things in life so consistently touch people’s hearts as simple soap bubbles. He uses bubbles in performance to hook the imagination, sneak in some “oh, wow” experiences about wave interference patterns, thin films, and chemistry, but mostly to help people re-experience a piece of innocence. With a friend, he is currently attempting to engineer a 10′ bubble on the Marin Headlands that (with luck) will float over the Golden Gate Bridge, into the Bay, and pop on Alcatraz.

Perrin Chiles is the founder of In Effect Films, a socially-conscious documentary film company which produced Emmy Award Nominee AUTISM: The Musical. The film takes a dynamic and intimate look inside the lives of several families with Autistic children as they create, prepare and then perform a live musical play on stage. Perrin will talk about the world of Autism and why people commonly refer to Autistic individuals living in their “own worlds,” or bubbles—and how the children in the film broke through their bubbles to defy stereotypes of what Autistic children can and cannot do.

This program will take place at the series’ usual home, Santa Monica Art Studios. (Santa Monica Art Studios, 3026 Airport Ave, Santa Monica, CA 90405 map) Come at 6 for refreshments and wander the studios. Program begins at 6:30. For more information and directions, please visit the website. Consider sending an RSVP to 310-397-7449 or Sabine [at] santamonicaartstudios [dot] com (but if you forget, don’t let that stop you from coming!!) They ask for a $5 donation to cover expenses.

-cvj