Digitally Exposed

They had a digital arts exhibition (DAX) at Dartmouth the other night, and of course we our interest was piqued since we lean toward all things digital in this house, especially the kids. When it comes to creative digital composition, I'm all for encouraging the kids to check it out. Evening events are always a little tricky because it not only dips into mealtime, but we have so many things going on in the afternoon/evening that it takes a fair amount of juggling.

Now this time around, for reasons I can't quite recall, we were out all day running errands or doing something that made the day more complicated. I managed to get the kids some sushi for lunch, and then mom picked up some supper and had it waiting for us at the school. We wolfed down a few bites and then headed into the Expo.

The first segment was a selection of digitally animated short films made by Dartmouth students and alumni, and it was cool except for the fact that we had seen more than half of them at the earlier student exhibit. I contacted the person in charge and she said it would be different, but clearly we had our signals crossed. After the film we headed over to the Hop and checked out the displays, some of which were cool, others that had me scratching my head and wondering what it had to do with digital arts. Another thing that really struck me looking at the show was that Dartmouth really is a small school. I realize it's a prestigious Ivy League and all, but at times you realize that the scale is significantly smaller than bigger universities. I think if a similar program went on at my alma mater, it would have been huge and probably a little more high tech, especially since it's located in a huge entertainment hub.

Either way, it was fun to attend, and they had some food and these amazing brownies. It's nice to expose the kids to some creative ideas to pursue when they get older, and we got to see some old friends. In fact, our friend and neighbor LL is one of the professors who is in charge of the digital arts studio, how cool is that? I think she was behind the creation of the department, so that's a nice connection to have.

Until the next time, thanks for reading, and thanks to mrhurt03 for the pic.