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Meson Visualizations: A
Collaboration of Art and Physics
By Shawne Neeper
How would neutron decay look at human
scale and in full Technicolor? From September 9 to October 1, the halls
of the Research Office Building (ROB, Bldg. 48) will come alive with
visualizations of quantum phenomena from standard-model collisions to
particle-wave duality.
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Dawn Meson’s painting
entitled Collision II is based on the standard model description
of a two-particle collision. (Photo courtesy of Dawn Meson) |
The exhibit marks the debut of artist Dawn
Meson’s body of work entitled Sum over Histories. In these paintings,
Meson uses color, translucency, texture and shape to represent the tiny,
invisible interactions that pervade our everyday world.
“One of the things that attracted me to
quantum physics in particular,” Meson said, “was that our instruments
can only see things down to a certain granularity and then it becomes a
theoretical exercise. As an artist, that’s interesting because these are
part of our natural world that can’t be captured by photography.”
In the painting entitled Particle Wave,
different colors and opacities symbolize the levels of probability for
‘where’ in quantum dimensions a particle lies. Another piece, called
Collision, visualizes the interactions of subatomic particles from a
two-particle collision as described in the standard model.
Time-lapse videos will appear alongside
the paintings. Each stop-action sequence—often including the artist,
brush in hand—shows steps in a painting’s evolution that reflect Meson’s
interpretation of stages in her quantum subject over time.
The Sum over Histories exhibit is an
adventure away from more literal paintings and drawings Meson has done
in recent years. She said the work doesn’t try for realism, but instead
aims to engage the visual imagination. “Imagination has a very large
role in the discovery and advancement of particle physics,” Meson said,
“and I think that’s something that art can speak to in some small way.”
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Meson at work in her studio.
The Sum of Histories Exhibit will run from September 9 to
October 1 in the ROB, Bldg. 48. (Photo courtesy of Dawn Meson) |
Cosmologist Influences Artistic Mind
Meson said her own imaginings of quantum
events were influenced in great part by conversations with SLAC
cosmologist Stephon Alexander (THP). Shortly after she began work on Sum
over Histories, Meson met Alexander at Farley’s coffee shop in the
Potrero Hill district of San Francisco. “I was doing some kind of
calculation or something and [Meson] noticed it,” Alexander said. “We
got into a conversation and a couple hours later… we established a
working friendship.” Over the months to come, Alexander and Meson would
meet to discuss the exercises in math and visualization that define
Alexander’s work process. “We got very far into the physics,” Alexander
said. “She has an exceptional ability to assimilate the mathematical
concepts that I can’t really explain with words.”
Public Reception on September 9
Meson’s take on those concepts will debut
in a public reception September 9 from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m., in the ROB,
which seems the ideal setting to showcase images of quantum physics. Its
corridors and galleries provide appropriate viewing space, while its
offices house a ready audience of particle physicists. Building manager
Harvey Lynch (BaBar)
toured ROB’s hallways with Meson to plan the exhibit. Meson took photos
of the best sites, then used Photoshop to paste in the paintings. “I’ve
taken that to the craft shop, to come up with a scheme to hang them,”
Lynch said. “We’re set to move ahead.”
Meson’s Web site previews Sum over
Histories and other collections. Visit:
http://www.dawnmeson.com
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