Thursday, April 26, 2018

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Thursday, April 26, 2018 | Indiana Daily Student | idsnews.com

INSIDE ANSWERING THE CALL: WHO CAN FIREFIGHTERS CALL FOR HELP?

Messel pleads guilty to battery By Hannah Boufford hbouffor@iu.edu | @hannahboufford

TY VINSON | IDS

Juniors Nicholas Gray and Georgia Dalton perform Sterling Manka's piece "Litost" during a ballet rehearsal Tuesday night at the Buskirk-Chumley Theater.

Experimental expression Ballet department to present original student choreography By Maura Johnson johnsmau@iu.edu | @Maujo997

“Ballet at the BCT: The Choreography Project” will take place at 7:30 p.m. Thursday at the BuskirkChumley Theater. The free event will showcase the work of student choreographers in the IU Ballet Department. Thirty-four choreographers auditioned for the show, and 21 were chosen. Director Sasha Janes said his role in the show has been to guide choreographers in their pieces. He is there to make suggestions on the structure of pieces, rather than on the content of students’ dances. “It has to be their piece,” he said. Junior Nicholas Gray choreographed a dance called “Choosing Happiness.” The piece features two songs by folk band Birdtalker, “Heavy” and “Want.” Gray said he classifies his dance as something you’d see more on a theater stage than a ballet stage. A challenge for him was getting his

dancers to go back to what it’s like to dance as a human in the community, rather than a ballet dancer. Gray said he tried to spend most of his time fostering intention in his dancers, and getting an emotional response from them, instead of working on perfecting moves in the style he choreographed. He said he hopes the dance is a cathartic experience for both his dancers and the audience. “I think, because it’s not super about the dance technique and such, they have to really hit it home with the message and the meaning,” he said. Sophomore Claire Donovan picked out the music for her piece in December and began choreographing it a month ago. Her piece, called “Blues Run the Game,” features a song by the same title. The dance is a pas de deux, a dance between a boy and a girl, she said. In the dance, you can’t tell who is giving who depression, or the blues. “If you have ever known any-

one with depression, like even if you get better, you still carry it with you,” she said. Both Gray and Donovan are performing in other dances in the showcase. Donovan said with dancing, it’s about repeating movements and perfecting it. Ballet dancing and choreography can both be an emotional outlet, she said, but choreography is an outlet in a different way. “You’re deciding what other people are going to do, so it’s more natural and unique to what you want, as opposed to when you’re dancing, you’re creating that movement from what other people want you to be doing,” she said. Donovan said sometimes it’s difficult to choreograph when you have an idea for a dance. “It’s almost like writer’s block, you feel like you can’t get it out,” she said. She said when going from dancing all day in regular dance classes to choreographing a dance, she got

stuck in the same movements. She said it’s helpful when you teach the dancers the dance, and they can help you move on and get out of your head. Janes said audiences can expect an eclectic array of movement at the show, and that many of the dancers have strong voices. “Some of them are just experimenting with movement, but some of them have something that they want to say with regard to their movement,” Janes said. Gray said his piece features dancers wearing backpacks of different colors. In the first section of the piece, the dancers come forward to express something they want and are sad in some way. The backpacks represent their burdens, which they throw off in the second section of the piece. The original title of the piece was supposed to be pessimistic, he said. He changed it to represent choosing to be happy. “I think that I’ve adopted that attitude in my life as well,” he said.

Interactive sculpture ‘not human, but alive’ By Emily Isaacman e isaacma@iu.edu | @emilyisaacman

Bristling white fronds, tubes of geometric wiring and fluid-filled glass bulbs hang within a creaturelike installation swooping above the central staircase in Luddy Hall. Brightly lit by small LED spotlights, the structure whispers, vibrates and flashes light in response to movements in its surroundings. The sculpture's name is Amatria. “It provides an engaging, interactive, computerized environment that feels not human, but alive,” Ph.D. student Andreas Bueckle said. Portions of the interactive art installation can be seen from any vantage point on the fourth floor of Luddy Hall, the state-of-theart facility that opened in January 2018 and houses the departments of computer science, information and library science and intelligent systems engineering. Canadian artist and architect Phillip Beesley calls his work sentient architecture, referring to the combination of art, architecture and intelligent system technology that composes the seemingly living landscape. Engineering and Information Science professor Katy Börner met Beesley at a conference two and a half years ago, and she helped enlist his work as Luddy Hall was being constructed. He visited campus several times over the past few years to plan and assemble 3-D-printed materials, artificial intelligence and sensors for the installation. Amatria is an intelligent system that gathers, processes and reacts

to information from its surroundings, reflecting the core of the Intelligent Systems Engineering program with which it shares a home, Bueckle said. In addition to enhancing the building’s public space, Bueckle said Amatria will serve as a learning tool for students, researchers and public visitors. Beesley invited students, faculty and community members to volunteer in building and installing pieces of the massive structure. Junior Clara Fridman said it was difficult for her to imagine how the tiny sticks, whiskers and branches she worked to assemble would fit into the final product. “Those are the parts you don’t think about when you see the finished picture,” Fridman said. Although its clear thicket of interlocking wires and bulbs appear dense on first glance, closer inspection reveals an intricate network of tiny parts.

“It’s kind of like the White Witch of Narnia majored in electrical engineering.” Martin Shedd, visiting professor of classical studies

The web even wraps through green exit signs hanging low from the ceiling. The sculpture’s light, motion and sound sensors and motor actuators allow students to practice creating codes that wirelessly communicate with its data streams. A new course being offered next fall, E484: Scientific Visual-

TY VINSON | IDS

“Amatria” hangs above the back stairwell in the atrium of Luddy Hall. The sculpture has sensors that tell parts of the sculpture to move. They are activated when someone walks under or gets near them.

ization, will use the sculpture to teach data visualization, which is the presentation of data through pictures and graphs. Bueckle, whose research focuses on data visualization literacy, said bioengineers, neuroengineers and researchers in his field have expressed interest in using the artificial organism for research. “People have a natural curiosity towards her,” Bueckle said. He worked closely with Beesley to develop an app called Tavola to work in tandem with the sculpture. While the app is not yet available for public use, Bueckle said it will eventually help teach visitors why and how Amatria acts the way it does. The app has two features, which Bueckle refers to as stories. The first story displays a zoomable, rotatable 3-D model of Amatria to help visitors locate and understand its technical aspects, such as

sensors, speakers and microprocessors. The second story depicts how two of Amatria’s 18 infrared sensors respond to movement in its surroundings in real time. These sensors, distributed in six pods of small, low-hanging black boxes around the sculpture, measure distances to foreign objects and generate reactive lights, sounds and vibrations nearby. Amatria’s constant shifts and noises cause many passers-by to slow their tracks, heads craned upward and mouths gaped open, as they emerge from the stairwell beneath it. Some stop to take pictures or videos with their iPhones. Others take cautious steps beneath the canopy, observing how it reacts to their movements. One man waved his hand above SEE LUDDY, PAGE 6

Daniel Messel, already serving 80 years for the murder of IU student Hannah Wilson, was sentenced to 15 years in prison Tuesday for attacking another student. Messel, 52, originally faced five charges stemming from a night where he allegedly threw a law student to the ground, sexually assaulted her and punched her in the face — hard enough to make her spit blood and knock the contact out of her eye. On Tuesday, the woman addressed him in court. “You’ve had power over me for quite some time,” she said. “You don’t have it anymore.” Messel pleaded guilty to an amended charge of felony battery resulting in serious bodily injury. The other charges, including one of rape, were dropped, and the sentence will be served concurrently with the 80-year one from the Wilson murder. Messel interrupted the woman multiple times in court as she spoke. He said he did not want to hear her “fantasy” unrelated to the battery charge. Judge Marc Kellams pointed at Messel and told him to stop interrupting the woman. “I will have you gagged and bound to your chair if I need to,” he said. The student continued to recount the attack and its effects on her. According to court documents, in the early morning of September 1, 2012, Messel drove the then-law student to a wooded area in Monroe County and attempted sexual contact with her while driving. He then pulled her out of the car by her hair and SEE MESSEL, PAGE 6

WOMEN’S BASKETBALL

Buss signs WNBA training contract From IDS reports

Tyra Buss’ storied career at IU officially ended with the Hoosiers’ victory in the WNIT championship March 31. However, she took the next step of her basketball career Tuesday. After not being selected in the 2018 WNBA Draft on April 12, Buss has signed a training camp contract with the Connecticut Sun. The Sun's head coach is Curt Miller, who originally recruited Buss to come to IU for her college career. However, Miller stepped down as head coach the summer before Buss' freshman year and current coach Teri Moren took over. "We are happy for Tyra and this opportunity to attend a WNBA training camp,” Moren said in an IU athletics press release. “I know she has everything it takes to be successful at the next level and we wish her the best as she begins her professional career.” Buss ended her career in Bloomington at the top or near the top of nearly every IU statistical category. She wound up as the Hoosiers’ all-time leader in career points, assists, steals, free throws made and free throws attempted. She started all 134 games of her IU career and took the program to new heights alongside fellow senior Amanda Cahill. In their sophomore season, they helped lead IU to their first NCAA tournament appearance in 14 years and first NCAA tournament victory since 1983. In her final season, Buss averaged 20.8 points, 4.7 assists, 2.1 steals and 40 minutes per game, while shooting 42 percent from the field and 33 percent from behind the three-point line. Buss also finished her career as a three-time All-Big Ten First Team and Academic All-Big Ten nominee. If Buss gets a spot on the Sun's main roster, she will begin her WNBA career when the 2018 season begins on May 18. Murphy Wheeler and Dylan Wallace


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Thursday, April 26, 2018 by Indiana Daily Student - idsnews - Issuu