A still from Julia Trowbridge’s film, The Chemist, on display now at the Art and Science Exhibition in the Curfman Gallery.
First-year Department of Chemistry student Julia Trowbridge’s film, The Chemist, was chosen to be on display at the 2017 Art and Science Exhibition at the Curfman Galley in the Lory Student Center.
Students as well as faculty and staff were encouraged to submit their best science-inspired art – and art-inspired science – to this year’s event. The Chemist, along with more than two dozen other pieces, will be on display until March 24.
Chemistry in the form of poetry
Trowbridge is originally from Austin, Texas, and at a young age was interested in art and science. She discovered her passion for photography during middle school and currently shoots photography for the Collegian.
Chemistry became an interest when Trowbridge took an AP chemistry class her senior year in high school. After working with two different teachers, she was convinced that chemistry was what she wanted to study in college.
At Colorado State University, Trowbridge began her study of chemistry through solar cells and pursued her interests in photography and film making. She also participates in slam poetry and wanted to combine all of her passions in art and science, so she produced a spoken word poem with video to create her film, The Chemist.
She melded the science of different chemical reactions – from thermite to glassblowing – with an artistically written poem. Trowbridge said, “I see film as an art, and so filming chemical reactions was easy to put together and is aesthetically pleasing.” Trowbridge submitted three pieces to this year’s exhibition and plans to do more collaborations in the future.
Trowbridge was encouraged by Professor Nancy Levinger to enter her work into the exhibition. She was able to produce her film in 11 days, and her recent involvement in the CSU film club helped her polish the piece. She said, “It was fun in terms of running around to different labs to capture chemical reactions and learning about different things along the way.”
This year’s exhibition shows the talents of members of the CSU community, just like Trowbridge, from disciplines around campus. Everything from film, photography, printmaking, and poetry are on display for the public to view.
