The San Francisco–based art collective FoldHaus enlisted tech help from then-undergrad Bomani McClendon ’17 when it was building Shrumen Lumen for Burning Man 2016. McClendon, now a software engineer for Facebook, worked as a programmer on the 12- to 18-foot tall mushrooms, which are now on display at the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum. With Kalan Kircher ’11, the digital lead for the project, McClendon programmed the giant glowing mushrooms to move and light up when observers step on a weight-sensitive pressure pad. The origami-based interactive art installation is part of the Renwick Gallery’s exhibition No Spectators: The Art of Burning Man, which runs until January.
The Art of Activism
When his dreams of directing theater fizzled, Art Johnston ’75 MFA instead took up the fight for queer rights in Chicago. Together with his husband, Pep Peña, he co-founded Sidetrack, an innovative gay bar that’s now the largest in the Midwest, and lobbied for passage of groundbreaking civil rights laws that have made Chicago a welcoming place for the LGBTQIA+ community.
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