This annual exhibition presents works related to the Benjamin Menschel Fellowships granted to selected Cooper Union students to further work on projects related to art, architecture, design and engineering. This year's projects include:

Tracing the Forgotten: Tibetan Vernacular Architecture

Yu Kiu Chan, Kelsey Lee, Piao Liu (architecture)

Central to the culture of the “grand architectural heritage” is the review of the palaces and monasteries of old Tibet. At the same time, Tibetan practices and techniques of building homes and villages reflect the highly versatile and resourceful lifestyle of the people.

Home—This Must Be the Place: Abandoned Homes in Japan and Baltimore

Maja Griffin (art)

A comparison study of Baltimore with cities in Japan, which has over eight million abandoned homes across the nation. The project was shaped by three questions: What happens to memories of a home that does not exist anymore? How do we express our feelings about this loss? In a structural sense, what do we mean by home?

A Bowl of Ocean Soup

Jenny Hsiao and Hui Rong Liu (architecture)

The way we eat and the stories and memories we have of food form a visceral level of our identity. Where does the fish in your bowl come from? Along the archipelagos of the Inside Passage, one of the largest salmon industries in the world, we trace the spaces and cadences of salmon production, of fishing, farming, shipping, market, kitchen and hearth.

Charting Kala Pani

Sarah Schmitt and Anamika Singh (art)

An investigation of the Cellular Jail or Kala Pani in Port Blair of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands located between the Bay of Bengal and the Andaman Sea. Charting Kala Pani maps, relationships and modes of memorialization in a former penal colony with a complex colonial past. 

Lake Baikal: The Lore of the Land

Daniil Ashtaev (art)

Research into the deepest and oldest water reservoir in the world—the mighty Lake Baikal in Siberia. It contains roughly a fifth of the world’s fresh water, equivalent to the volume of all five of the Great Lakes, and harbors hundreds of endemic species.

Images courtesy of the respective Menschel Fellows

Opening Reception: January 31, 6 p.m. - 8 p.m.

Free and open to the public | Tuesday - Saturday 11am -7pm

5th and 6th floor lobbies