28 | EXPLORE WINTER 2023 Last year marked the first time the Cleveland Museum of Natural History has participated in FRONT International: Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art, a free, public contemporary-art exhibition. The triennial, which debuted in 2018 as a way to introduce the art world to Cleveland and vice versa, returned in 2022 after being delayed for a year by the COVID-19 pandemic. FRONT 2022 was titled Oh, Gods of Dust and Rainbows, an homage to a couplet by renowned American poet Langston Hughes, who spent part of his childhood in Cleveland. The exhibition, which ran from July 16 through October 2, sprawled across 30 venues in Northeast Ohio and featured the work of more than 100 artists, including Berlin-based Asad Raza. Raza’s contribution to FRONT 2022, a public sculpture called Orientation, was installed on Wade Oval last summer. A human-scale version of the 16th-century astronomical instruments at Jantar Mantar in Jaipur, India, Orientation is made of materials gathered from Lake Erie, such as zebra and quagga mussel shells. The Cleveland Museum of Natural History—home to the Hexter Collection, a remarkable array of historical sundials and navigational instruments—was an obvious choice to partner with Raza and his team. Museum astronomers Nick Anderson and Peter Hedman shared background information and technical advice with Raza, including how to adapt the sculpture’s sundial to Cleveland's latitude. Museum Astronomers Celebrated the Autumn Equinox Featuring the Work of FRONT International 2022 Artist Asad Raza In September, the Museum collaborated with FRONT 2022 and Raza on two events celebrating the autumn equinox. On September 23, Raza joined Anderson, Hedman, and historian of astronomy Aviva Rothman of Case Western Reserve University in the Museum’s Murch Auditorium for a discussion about the astronomical and scientific history behind Orientation’s conception and realization. After covering Raza’s design process, the conversation ranged widely across topics—from observatories of the past to modern methods of studying the stars. A lively question-and-answer session concluded the evening. The following day, Raza joined Anderson, Hedman, and Museum astronomer Destiny Thomas on Wade Oval to guide visitors
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