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He tweets in French, English, and Farsi. He’ll set up an empty chair in front of his own chair on a busy sidewalk just to see who stops by, documenting the results in photographs. His portfolio includes photographs of shopkeepers holding portraits of dead relatives; photo assemblages “created to raise suspicion”’; photographs gathered from dozens of artists and sold to benefit children with cancer, children in poverty, children in need of human rights protection.

Comics aren’t always funny. Think “Doonesbury,” which makes pointed political digs. Or Joe Sacco’s graphic novels about Arab-Palestinian conflicts. And the mid-20th century’s “Pogo,” by Walt Kelly, which engaged in social and political satire. But plenty of comics definitely elicit at least a chuckle if not a ROFL response. What the best have in common is lushly rendered artwork, complex characters, and strong storylines that compel readers to keep coming back.

The connection between Oregon and the United Kingdom just lost a champion. Architect Rick Mather, 75, who sponsored six UO students as interns in his award-winning firm, Rick Mather Architects (RMA), passed away April 20 after a short illness. Classmates, former faculty members, and colleagues were stunned as news spread.

This month marks the 40th anniversary Oregon Senate Bill 100, which created the most progressive land use program in the nation. The law’s success has required an army of advocates, including three UO graduates.

Read more on the A&AA blog.

Architecture Professor James T. Tice has been selected for the 2013 UO Outstanding Research Career Award, sponsored by the Office for Research, Innovation and Graduate Education. The award highlights outstanding research activities at the UO.

Think Nike in Beaverton. Google in Palo Alto. Urban Outfitters in Philadelphia. Corporate campuses aren’t unique, but having one downtown is. Helping design such a campus in a dynamic city like Portland is an even rarer opportunity, but that’s precisely what a cadre of University of Oregon graduate students are doing.

Two floors of the School of Architecture and Allied Arts will be filled with art installations by senior-year undergraduates on May 31 from 5-8 p.m. 2013 SPRING STORM: Department of Art Annual Senior Show will take place in Lawrence Hall, 1190 Franklin Boulevard, on the University of Oregon campus in Eugene.

Fully ten percent of participants at the 2013 Architectural Research Centers Consortium Spring Conference at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte were A&AA faculty members, current students, or alumni. Given that the theme of the conference was visibility, the UO certainly took the concept to heart. 

Architecture Adjunct Instructor Jolie Kerns has been awarded a $6,000 research grant from the UO Center for the Study of Women in Society for her project "Interrogating Public Space: Architecture of Women's Health Centers."

The new Facade Integrated Technologies (FIT) Testing Facility celebrated its completion April 15 with a “soft opening” that showcased the laboratory’s presence on the entire south face of Onyx Bridge. An "envelope" on the building’s façade is wired with sensors measuring light intensity, solar radiation, wind speed, acoustics and more — all part of an effort to study building performance and how design and systems affect occupants.