Christopher X J. Jensen
Associate Professor, Pratt Institute

STEAMplant project brings local primary school kids to Pratt’s Textile Dye Garden

Posted 30 Nov 2022 / 0

I am excited about having participated in a wonderful STEAMplant project headed up by Art and Design Education graduate student Ana Codorean. The project focused on how to get local public school students thinking about interdependence and the ways in which natural dyes can be used in creative work. Encompassing an impressive breadth of scientific Read More

A Major Post, Art & Design, Coevolution, Community Ecology, Competition, Department of Mathematics & Science, Ecology, Ecology Education, Fashion, Green Design, Interactions, Mutualism, Pollination, Pratt Institute, Public Outreach, Reciprocity, Science in Art & Design, STEAMplant, Sustainability, Teaching

Core of Me short video

Posted 09 Apr 2020 / 0

I was fortunate to be a collaborator on a STEAMplant team that included Sirovich Family Resident Jeremy Pickard (@jeremy_pickard) and my Pratt colleague, anthropologist Jennifer Telesca. Jeremy’s STEAMplant project focused on the creation of a short “hike-play” which required the audience to take a walk in the woods before seeing the actual performance. This short video, created Read More

A Minor Post, Art & Design, Climate Change, Ecology, Public Art, STEAMplant, Temperate Forest

I will be participating in the 2019 NCEP Teaching & Learning Studio

Posted 05 May 2019 / 0

Image Source: Wikimedia Commons I am very excited to be a participant in the American Museum of Natural History‘s Network of Conservation Educators and Practitioners (NCEP) program’s 2019 Teaching and Learning Studio. This year’s theme is “Effective Teaching by Design”, which describes a lot of the scholarship that I have been doing over the years and Read More

A Minor Post, Conservation Biology, Ecology Education, Education, Evolution Education, Higher Education, Museum design, Museums & Zoos

My interview with Ardis DeFreece has been published in SciArt Magazine

Posted 15 Feb 2019 / 0

Ardis DeFreece creating the “Curiosity” installation at the Hatfield Marine Science Center I am very excited that my interview with painter and draftswoman Ardis DeFreece has been published in SciArtMagazine. You can read the interview, “Ardis DeFreece: Curiosity at the Intersection Between Art and Science“, for free. I met Ardis at the 2017 Ecological Society of Read More

A Major Post, Anthropogenic Change, Art & Design, Ecology, Ethics, Public Art, Science (General), Science in Art & Design, STEAMplant

When it comes to considering sex and gender, don’t forget sex determination

Posted 22 Oct 2018 / 0

Scientific American “Beyond XX and XY: The Extraordinary Complexity of Sex Determination” I teach about sex and gender in a lot of my courses. For some courses, such as Evolution or The Evolution of Sex, these are basic concepts that need to be established in order to study reproductive behaviors. For other courses, such as Breeders, Propagators, & Read More

A Minor Post, Information Design, MSCI-362, The Evolution of Sex, Sex and Reproduction

Why Artists & Designers need Scientists: Exhibit A

Posted 22 Oct 2017 / 1

I have always had a prediliction to root for the little guy, but sometimes you actually need to be the little guy to see how little guys are treated. And at Pratt, a behemouth of art and design, science is the little guy (or if you prefer, gal… in our department our most presigious scientists Read More

A Minor Post, Adaptation, Art & Design, Behavior, Cognitive Bias, Cultural Evolution, Evolution, Evolutionary Psychology, Fashion, Gene-Culture Coevolution, Genetics, Happiness, Human Evolution, Industrial Design, Pratt Institute, Psychological Adaptation, Science in Art & Design

Interdisciplinary artist Ellie Irons to speak at Pratt Institute on November 9th

Posted 20 Oct 2017 / 0

I am very excited to announce that artist Ellie Irons will speak at Pratt Institute on November 9th, 2017 at 6 pm in ARC Building Room E-02. Her talk is entitled Public Fieldwork & Weedy Resistance: Practicing Social-Ecological Art in the (so-called) Anthropocene and will provide a tour of her diverse individual and collaborative works of Read More

A Major Post, Activism, Adaptation, Biodiversity Loss, Climate Change, Commensalism, Community Ecology, Competition, Department of Mathematics & Science, Ecological Restoration, Ecology, Ecosystem Services, Grasslands, Habitat Destruction, Habitat Fragmentation, Invasive Species, Mutualism, Pollination, Pollution, Pratt Academic Senate, Public Art, Public Outreach, Resilience, Science in Art & Design, Sustainability, Sustainable Urban Design, Temperate Forest, Urban Ecology, Urban Planning

Deep Look on nutrient transport by salmon

Posted 09 Oct 2017 / 0

I have taught about the importance of nutrient transport by salmon in my Ecology course before, using an old Scientific American article. But this video is amazing. The footage of the salmon spawning and of blowfly maggots devouring a salmon carcass are phenomenal. A great teaching tool for talking about how community ecology drives nutrient Read More

A Minor Post, Decomposition, Ecology, Ecology Education, Film & Video, Film, Television, & Video, Freshwater Ecosystems, Keystone Species, MSCI-270, Ecology, Mutualism, Nutrient Cycling, Predation, Rivers & Streams, Temperate Forest

Transfer of Learning FLC to present at Pratt lunch event

Posted 04 Oct 2017 / 0

One of the most rewarding things that I have been involved with professionally in the last year is also something that I haven’t yet had time to write about. It’s my beloved Faculty Learning Community (FLC), which was constituted just over a year ago. FLC’s are a nationwide movement in academia, and although their configuration and Read More

A Major Post, Art & Design, General Education, Higher Education, Pratt Institute, Teaching

Who was the first to catalog color? Hint: it wasn’t designers!

Posted 23 Sep 2017 / 0

Pantone color book image courtesy of Carlos Paes via Wikimedia Commons Allison Meier has a very illuminating short piece on where the Pantone color system came from: Hyperallergic “The Bird-Based Color System that Eventually Became Pantone“ What I find interesting about this history is the convergent need of people in vastly different areas of science Read More

A Minor Post, Art & Design, Birds, Methods, Science in Art & Design, Web