Situated on the south bank of the Willamette River, the University of Oregon riverfront fields are — to put it politely — rugged. Often overlooked, these fields are only noticed during the walk to Autzen that guides Duck fans through the patchy riverfront grass. But the fields are a burden for those that use and maintain them on a regular basis.

“There’s potholes everywhere, big dirt patches,” said Spencer de Urioste, president and captain of the men’s club rugby team. “It’s terribly maintained.”

The men’s and women’s rugby teams practice and play on the fields. The teams are responsible for substantial field preparation before each game: painting the boundary and endzone lines, filling in holes and more. But even with the teams’ efforts, players still complain the fields are a safety hazard.

“We’ve had players twist their ankles, hurt their knee really badly just by stepping in gopher holes [and] ditches,” said Charles Dimer, member and operations manager of the men’s rugby team.

Plans are in motion that may change the current riverfront atmosphere.

On Feb. 26, the University of Oregon Campus Planning Committee submitted its North Campus Conditional Use Permit to the city of Eugene for approval. The plan designates room for development of areas north of the railroad tracks, including space for three new athletic fields.

Campus Planning began work on the land use permit in early 2017. Since then, intentions behind the plan stirred controversy among faculty and community members. Of particular concern are the proposed athletic fields along the riverfront.

Although the permit doesn’t specify materials, Mike Harwood, associate vice president of Campus Planning and campus architect, said it would be a logical conclusion to assume that the fields will be artificial turf during a Feb. 14 UO senate meeting.

The Riverfront Field. (Sarah Northrop/Emerald)

Environmental impact

Campus Planning says UO needs more athletic fields to accommodate growth and attract students. Opponents say building turf fields on the riverfront is ecologically inappropriate and other viable options exist for the area. Emily Eng, senior planner with Campus Planning, explained that while the permit calls for new athletic fields in that area, their construction isn’t guaranteed.

A conditional use permit is an initial requirement for any construction project: it diagrams the maximum potential use for a piece of land. The permit doesn’t need to include detailed renderings of the infrastructure — think of it as UO requesting permission to build something in an area, should a need be identified.

But as Eng said, UO identified the need for additional fields in the Framework Vision Project, a 2014 report that informs campus planning decisions. Given the specific space requirements, finding a place for athletic fields is an issue, Eng said.

Bitty Roy, professor of ecology at UO, isn’t satisfied. She said artificial turf fields on the riverfront would harm the surrounding environment, especially if the fields were lit at night.

According to her, field lighting would disrupt the navigation of migratory birds. Even if the light was funneled not to shine directly into the sky, Roy said a substantial amount of light would still reflect off the surface of the field.

“They are beginning to think about the river as an asset, and that’s brilliant,” Roy said. “It just needs a little bit more thought about what makes sense to go down there and how to use it in a way that isn’t just saying, ‘Ok, we need more space for playing fields,’ but instead, ‘How can we make this a showcase for the university?’”

Eng said that the plan doesn’t specify field lights. If lights were constructed, Campus Planning would take measures to mitigate the negative impacts.

“The plan is not required to be that specific,” Eng said. “So we haven’t specified surface material or whether there will be lights or not. It’s just the use of the land. It just says we propose ‘this’ amount of square footage for recreation fields.”

Roy also said evidence exists that suggests artificial turf fields leach harmful chemicals into the environment. The surface of turf can reach over 160 degrees in Oregon summers, which she said could stress the surrounding vegetation.

“In general, artificial turf is like putting a parking lot out there,” Roy said. “It’s a petroleum product.”

Eng said that if the fields were made from artificial turf, UO would commit to treating stormwater runoff from the fields.

The materials debate is a snapshot of the larger discussion that has waged since summer 2017: are athletic fields even the best use for this riverfront space? According to Eng, it’s complicated.

“It’s not like you couldn’t put [the fields] somewhere else,” Eng said. “But if you put them somewhere else, they’re displacing some other use that really needs to be there, like classroom buildings or open space.” There aren’t any existing open spaces big enough to accomodate a recreation field, she said.

A softball tangled in greenery just beyond the Riverfront Field’s fence. (Sarah Northrop/Emerald)

Up for debate

Bart Johnson, UO associate professor of landscape architecture, thinks the university should develop and restore the riverfront area to attract environmental science, biology and landscape architecture students. He said he can’t think of another campus that has a large river in such close proximity, and that this North Campus Conditional Use Permit is an opportunity to showcase the university’s commitment to environmental sustainability.

“[The fields] take up a large amount of area for, relatively, a small number of people,” Johnson said. “The fact is, you need someplace flat. The university is unwilling to allocate other potential building areas not near the river for the ball field needs.”

According to Johnson, an advisory group to UO comprised of ecologists and landscape architects suggested in the summer of 2017 that an alternative plan without athletic fields on the riverfront should be considered. Johnson later attended a meeting where alternative plans were presented, expecting to see a spectrum of proposals.

“Every single one of them had ball fields,” he said. “They differed in minor ways, in the positioning of the trails, things like that. But they didn’t look at the full range of opportunities that some of the stakeholders — who they had engaged — said should be considered.”

Eng said that plans excluding athletic fields weren’t considered because the permit needed to show the maximum potential development for the area.

“You could do nothing,” Eng said. “You could do all of [the permit]. But it’s likely going to fall somewhere in between that. For that reason, there has not been an alternative to a plan that doesn’t show recreation fields.”

Roy doesn’t see it the same way.

“The lack of vision about the riverfront is upsetting because it is the most phenomenal thing we have on this campus,” Roy said. “It could be used for the kinds of advertising that the UO is always talking about and never doing. Instead there is the continuing focus on sports. And I am not against sports and exercise, I’m just against them on the riverfront.”

The Office of the Provost and Academic Affairs held a meeting on Feb. 26 to address concerns voiced by opponents of the plan.

Johnson attended the meeting and said no one mentioned that the permit had been submitted. He said the confusion surrounding the meeting is emblematic of UO’s attitude toward opponents of the plan.

According to Eng, in the weeks prior to the meeting, faculty members associated with the UO Senate were notified that the permit would be submitted around that date, regardless of further discussion.

In response to the permit submittal, faculty, students and Eugene community members created the Riverfront Restoration and Education Group. The group views the permit submittal as a symbolic end of discussion. Johnson, a member, said there should be more time to deliberate, and to expect a motion in favor of withdrawing the permit to be introduced to the UO Senate.

But Campus Planning and permit opponents have compromised some. Previously, the permit called for a 100-foot buffer between any development and the river. Due to feedback from Johnson, Roy and others, the buffer was increased to 200 feet.

Eng also mentioned other revisions: restricting the height and coverage of buildings north of the railroad tracks and slashing the amount of athletic fields from five to three.

“I admit that these planning documents are not very inspirational, they’re really just designating the big blobs of land usage,” Eng said. “So when people see the possibility of recreation fields — this big blob here and a blob here for conservation — they are not seeing how they can actually work together or what that experience might be like, because we are not at that level of detail yet.”

UO’s previous land use permit for the riverfront area expired after 23 years. Only three buildings from that plan were ever constructed, but Eng said that is no indication of this permit’s potential. Eng said she expects approval from the city this summer. A public comment period would follow should the permit be approved.

The UO Rec Center has jurisdiction over the current riverfront fields. Al Diaz, assistant director of operations at the Rec, acknowledges the area is not ideal. He explained that because the fields are not fenced and far from campus, the Rec can’t improve them.

“We’ve had talks about turfing them and such but those are always just discussions,” Diaz said. “It takes a lot of money to turf a field, a huge commitment too.”

As of now, four turf fields exist adjacent to the Rec. Between physical education classes, intramural sports, club sports and general recreation time, Diaz said that allotting programs their fair share of time can present a challenge.

“I do think we need more fields,” Diaz said. “I think it would always benefit students to have more options and more availability and more for them to do and organize. I think that’s part of their development and part of their mental and physical health.”

Have some input? Tell the Emerald what you think the University of Oregon should do with its riverfront property here. 

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The University of Oregon Campus Planning department formally submitted their North Campus Conditional Use Permit to the city of Eugene for approval Monday.

A 30-day grace period exists on the application, so Campus Planning will have the opportunity to tinker with the suggested plan based on suggestions from the city. Once the application is considered complete, a comprehensive review process will begin by the city. A decision whether or not to approve the permit is expected this summer.

A subject of much debate, the current North Campus Conditional Use Permit suggests development of the area north of the railroad tracks, including space for three athletic fields and restoration of the riverbank.

Full North Campus Proposal document here

Read the full story about the permit this Monday, March 5.

Follow Franklin Lewis on Twitter (@flewis_1)

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This is the first episode of a new Emerald sports podcast focusing on baseball, with hosts Frankie Lewis and Cal Will. On this inaugural episode, the duo focuses on the biggest signings of the offseason and previews the rest of the season for the Oregon Ducks after they went 2-1 in their first three games in Las Vegas last weekend.

This episode was produced by Alec Cowan.

The post Podcast: Emerald baseball’s inaugural podcast appeared first on Emerald Media.

If she had it her way, Ellie Jones would have started campaigning for ocean life 30 years ago. The only problem: she was not born yet.

Jones, a junior marine biology major at the University of Oregon, is the creator and administrator of Everblue, an ocean conservation awareness project. The project is simple: sift through scientific journals and databases to find facts or new discoveries related to ocean ecosystems. Jones along with her diverse team of undergrads, graduate students and professors from across the country translate these findings into tips, which are pushed out through Everblue’s Instagram, Facebook — and as of last week — Twitter.

“Pairing it down to just one or two sentences has definitely been a challenge,” Jones said. “If you’re scrolling through Instagram, nobody is going to take the time to read paragraphs.”

Besides recruiting fellow science majors, Jones gets help from journalism and graphic design majors as well. She said the goal of Everblue is to address climate change-caused problems in the ocean by influencing individual decision making, rather than pushing for large-scale legislation.

Ellie Jones, creator and administrator of Everblue. (Natalie Waitt-Gibson/Emerald)

“We are just inundated constantly with all this negative news about how we’re destroying everything,” Jones said. “So then I think people really are looking for ways they can help, even if they are small — especially if they are small.”

Everblue posts appear in two forms: research posts and tip posts. A research post presents a marine biology fact or statistic, accompanied by a photo from Everblue’s large database of marine photography. Jones and her colleagues take their photos during various scuba diving and ocean adventures.

A tip post follows a research post in quick succession. Tip posts demonstrate how research post fact could inform individual decision making. For example, a Feb. 8 research post on the Everblue Instagram page cited a study that found plastics are responsible for 60 to 80 percent of ocean debris. The sequential tip post suggested people shop at grocery stores that use compostable produce bags instead of plastic.

“That’s what the goal of our project is: to let people know that they can make a difference, give them ideas, plant the seed of that idea.”

Occasionally Jones and her team will publish what she calls a “hope” post, highlighting a promising aspect of marine conservation. “It’s to just give people that little extra vote of confidence,” she said. “It’s not all gloom and doom. We’re not just hitting our heads against a brick wall.”

Jones forged the framework for Everblue last winter break during a visit to a coffee shop. Walking in with an idea, she walked out four hours later with nine pages of notes detailing how Everblue should function.

“I feel like I am really blessed to be able to have this education that I do,” she said. “So I want to take that and use it to teach other people. And also, scientific data is great but if we don’t do anything with it then it just sits in this big database of ‘the literature.’”

Jones said she loves her undergraduate classwork and acknowledges she must ascend the proverbial scientific ladder. But Jones wants to take action now.  

“It’s a lot easier to talk about trees and the environment and the weather change — all that stuff,” Jones said. “But when it’s under the water and out of people’s line of daily thought then it is really easy to lose sight of how [the ocean] affects all of us.

Everblue is partnering with the Oregon Marine Biology Institute Student Association to host a screening of the documentary “Chasing Coral” on Thursday, February 22 from 7:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. in the Lease Crutcher Lewis room at the EMU.

Follow Franklin Lewis on Twitter (@flewis_1)

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Only three percent of the water on earth is drinkable. More water is hidden underground than in all of earth’s rivers, lakes and streams combined. Thirty five percent of all the water people use comes from these underground reservoirs called aquifers.

Facts revealing the way humans use water in the 21st century are central to the Museum of Natural and Cultural History’s new exhibit, “H2O Today.” The University of Oregon brought the exhibit to campus through a partnership with the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service.  The American Museum of Natural History in New York developed the original concept.

Kristin Strommer, communications manager at the MNCH said, it can be a challenge to reproduce the spirit of the prestigious Smithsonian and infuse the MNCH’s local, unique twist on the exhibit.

Besides the panels imported from the Smithsonian, the MNCH’s version of the H2O exhibit incorporates a video display board devoted to University of Oregon faculty working on water security issues.

“Our collections are primarily concerned with anthropology and paleontology,” Strommer said. “But there is so much going on at the University of Oregon in terms of scientific research that we really want to be able to show our public.”

The MNCH also designed interactive wall of plastic jugs that reveal how many gallons of water are required to produce certain goods like clothing and food. For example, one ream of paper takes around 1300 gallons to produce, according to Strommer.

Colored plastic jugs reveal the amount of water needed for various products. (Franklin Lewis/Daily Emerald)

The exhibit reinforces and expands on an idea that everyone learns at a young age. One panel reads: “Life exists only where there is water, and humans are totally dependent on access to fresh water each day.” The panels feature photos from around the world showing the endless ways people rely on water. Along with the photos, text descriptions and graphics describe how water drives food production, inspires art, influences faith and determines global climate.

The exhibit also draws attention to the inescapable facts of the human relationship with water. Many parts of the world lack access to clean water. Dirty or untreated water is often the conduit of disease, plus pollution adds strain to the drinkability of many water bodies.

Another panel says: “Every 90 seconds a child dies from a water-related disease. One in 10 people lack access to clean water. Women and children spend 125 million hours each day collecting water.”

Eugene resident Erica Mcgarrey said she came to the exhibit because she was curious what an entire exhibit devoted solely to water would look like. She was surprised to see the water usage of some of her household appliances such as her washing machine.

“It’s cool,” Mcgarrey said. “I’m learning things that I never even think about on a daily basis.”

H20 Today opened January 20. The MNCH is open Tuesday through Sunday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Follow Max Egener (@maxegener) and Franklin Lewis (@flewis_1) on Twitter.

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In this episode of Spotlight on Science, arts and culture writer Frankie Lewis speaks with Dr. James Schombert, an observational astronomer at the University of Oregon. The two discuss a medley of cosmological topics, including the dark matter theory, the search for alien life, NASA gossip and much more.

Spotlight on Science is a series from the Emerald Podcast Network designed to spark conversations across disciplines with researchers at the University of Oregon, bringing in researchers to discuss their work in a way that is understandable to everyone.

Music in this episode is “Zombie Disco” by Six Umbrellas.

This episode was produced by Alec Cowan.

The post Podcast: Spotlight on Science: Cosmology with Dr. James Schombert appeared first on Emerald Media.

A student heads to the water fountain during a break in class. A professor, preparing a lecture, turns on the lights in the classroom with the flick of a switch. After a day in the laboratory, a research assistant washes their hands with hot water.

The University of Oregon community relies on these basic utilities and the people who keep them running. Unbeknownst to most, a labyrinth of underground tunnels shuttle steam, chilled water, electricity and compressed air from the Central Power Station to the entire campus. But besides providing these necessary utilities, the tunnels are also a source of campus mystery.

The veins: descending underground

Inside the tunnels, criss-crossing pipes and cables make navigating the corridors an adventure. Tunnel workers are required to climb over yards of pipe and are exposed to intense heat. This underground network reaches nearly every building on campus

“There are some parts of the tunnel [system] that are well ventilated and some that are not,” Tony Hardenbrook, director of utilities and energy at UO, said. “There are parts of the tunnel system that could reach — especially in the summertime — 100 degrees, 120 degrees.”

Hardhats, flashlights and radios are mandatory for work in the tunnels, as some stretches are dimly lit and have minimal height clearance. Signs posted on the tunnel corridors designating the entrance to various campus buildings make navigation easy. But being locked inside is an unnerving proposition.

“We walk the tunnels once a week for visual inspection to make sure every bit of it’s been looked at,” Hardenbrook said. “But otherwise you could be in there for days and nobody would know.”

The consequences of a burst pipe would be dire for a worker in close proximity, Hardenbrook explained. Rapid flooding, burns, and asphyxiation are all risks workers of the tunnels assume when they enter.

“These are hazards people above ground don’t need to worry about, but we deal with them every day,” Hardenbrook said.

Some parts of the tunnels date back to the 1940s. As campus grew, the tunnel system expanded too, and is now about four miles in total length.

“There are sections of the tunnels that are pristine,” Hardenbrook said of the more recent extensions to the network. “I’d sit down and eat in them if the rules allowed you to.”

Divided into two sections, the “west” tunnel heads south from the power station across Franklin Boulevard, then branches to various west and central campus buildings like Carson Hall, Columbia Hall and the HEDCO Education Building. The “east” tunnel services the Millrace Studios, Matthew Knight Arena and most other east university buildings. The imminent Knight Campus will also be accessed via the east tunnel.

The presence of a vast tunnel network has inspired myths and rumors among the campus community. Stories of ghosts and missing students, while unfounded, have captured the imagination of some — but not Hardenbrook.

“I’ll be honest, I’m not privy to any supernatural type of things,” Hardenbrook said. “I swim in the world of reality and practicality.”

In the past, students and other urban explorers have even snuck into the tunnels, but since Hardenbrook took his position in 2014, he has made it a point to limit access to the tunnels, including barring photography of tunnel maps.

“Probably about six months after I got here, about 40 of the tunnel doors were completely redone and new lock systems put on them,” Hardenbrook said. “There definitely was a security problem.”

The tunnel system was built as a way to save on utility maintenance costs, he explained. It provides workers immediate access to the various utility pipes and cables should something go awry. For instance, in the summer of 2016, 19 buildings on campus lost power. Hardenbrook confirmed that a rat wandered into an electrical vault underneath Johnson Hall and crawled over an exposed circuit, causing a fault in the circuitry.

“More modern equipment wouldn’t have this problem but we have a mixture of modern and older equipment,” Hardenbrook said. “Luckily we have since upgraded that particular vault.”

Although the rat perished, the direct access to the electrical vault enabled workers to restore power fairly easily, according to Hardenbrook. The tunnel network again came in handy during last winter’s ice storm. While the rest of Eugene experienced power outages, campus kept chugging.

“I live three minutes from this campus and I didn’t have power for four days,” Hardenbrook said.

Hard hats, flash lights and radios are required in the utility tunnels. Ben Green/Daily Emerald

The heart: Central Power Station

The tunnels are just one aspect of the utilities and energy department, though. The Central Power Station is located on the north side of Franklin Blvd, across the street from Onyx Bridge. It produces the utilities that the tunnels distribute. And although the power station purchases electricity from the Eugene Water and Electric Board, it has the capacity to produce enough electricity to power campus by itself during an emergency said Kyle Wilson, lead cogeneration engineer at the power station.

While the tunnels are confined spaces, the boiler room inside the power station is quite the opposite. Resembling a scene from “Titanic,” the boiler room is a massive warehouse containing UHaul-size boilers, a jet engine, generators, compressed air tanks and much more.

“We have a lot more load, as we call it, or demand when school is in,” Wilson said. “We plan a lot of our operations around the school schedule so that we can take equipment down to do necessary repairs on it, so it doesn’t impact those users on campus.”

The boiler room also has a wall-sized circuit board, with breaker switches for each machine needing electricity in the room.

“They’re just like all the circuit breakers at your house but just much bigger and higher voltage,” Wilson said.

The Central Power Station employs three main groups of people: maintenance, electricians and control room workers. Maintenance workers are tasked with the general cleanliness of the plant, electricians make sure the energy is getting from the power station to the university without hiccups. The control room staff monitor all the equipment in the boiler room and make general repairs in the tunnel system.

“Our greatest concern is safety,” Wilson said. “We all want to go home at the end of the day. We want everyone on campus to be safe.”

Hardenbrook enlisted two student workers to help bolster the safety of the plant and tunnel system. While their day-to-day work can sometimes be menial, the bulk of their responsibility is the creation of training videos for various aspects of the plant.

“I’m currently working on a lift training video,” Andres Harris, a student worker at the power station, said. “There are three different lifts around the plant, and my video explains how to operate them and what their purpose is.”

Harris, a junior and Sean Ewing, a freshman, are also putting together how-to videos about water testing machines, small spill cleanup and parking lot safety. Past student workers have created videos too, such as the tunnel safety video, which all tunnel workers are required to watch before entering.

“I didn’t even know the UO had a power plant,” Ewing said, recalling when he sent in his application for the job. “It’s not an opportunity I ever though I would have.”

While neither student has their future set on working at the power plant, they both expressed appreciation for their work environment.

“My boss told me: ‘This is how it was before. This is how it is now. Here are our plans for the future,’” Harris said. “It was really interesting to learn.”

Kyle Wilson went from working at True Value Hardware to holding the lead cogeneration engineer position in the control room. He said he remembered feeling overwhelmed by all the machinery in the boiler room. But now, he embraces the multifaceted utility system.

“That’s what I like about this job is the variety,” Wilson said. “It challenges you. I’m always learning something new just about every week.”

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If you are looking for a mushroom expert, look no further than Roo Vandegrift.

“Think of all the diversity you find in animals, everything from little shrimp to people, you find that same kind of diversity in fungi,” Vandegrift, a research assistant professor of fungal ecology at the University of Oregon, said. “Everything from the typical cap and gill mushroom to microscopic organisms that do all kinds of wild things.”

According to Vandegrift, 3.2 million fungi are estimated to exist on Earth, but only about 120,000 species have been documented. New discoveries from his trip to the Andean cloud forest — a high elevation rainforest — in Ecuador could add to that list of fungi.

“There could be dozens of new species sitting here on [this laboratory] benchtop right now,” Vandegrift said, “because tropical fungal diversity is so poorly described at the moment.”

Vandegrift and his research partner, Danny Newman, a freelance mycologist (fungi specialist) and photographer, collected 350 specimens of fungi from the nature reserve, Reserva Los Cedros. Now that their crowdfunding efforts are nearly complete, the two are preparing for the next stage of their project: sequencing the “barcode” gene of each specimen.

2014 fungal collections sit on a lab tabletop. (Sarah Northrop/Emerald)

The barcode gene, Vandegrift explains, codes for the production of ribosomes in cells. Ribosomes are responsible for transcribing DNA into RNA, a process that is essential for life at every level. In Vandegrift and Newman’s case, they used a piece of the ribosome gene known as the “internal transcribed spacer.”

“As evolution happens and species split, the sequence for that particular gene gets more and more different,” Vandegrift said. “The more different it is, the more divergent the organism.”

Getting their samples was a journey itself, though. To reach Reserva Los Cedros, Vandegrift flew to Quito, the capital of Ecuador. He then boarded a 6 a.m. bus that whisked him deep into the Andean mountains. Reaching a small village in the afternoon, they hired a pickup truck driver, bundled all their research gear into the bed of the truck, and trekked further into the rainforest.

“You drive to where the road literally ends,” Vandegrift said, “where you meet a mule train that’s come down from the mountain. You load all your stuff up onto mules and you hike or ride mules up into the mountains for three hours into this tractless wilderness before you finally get to Los Cedros.”

The variety of species found at Los Cedros made it an ideal location for Vandegrift to collect samples. Its close proximity to the equator and isolation from humanity allow the site to sustain a rich variety of species not seen in other parts of the world. The reserve is known to contain numerous species of birds, mammals, plants and of course, fungi.

Recently, Ecuador has opened more of the country to mining companies for resource extraction. As of June 2016, 80 percent of Los Cedros was signed over to a Canadian mining company, Cornerstone, but Vandegrift said that he hopes their work can highlight why the region should be preserved.

“There are more than 100 documented red-list endangered species that occur at Reserva Los Cedros,” Vandegrift said. “The better documented the diversity at a conservation location like this, the less likely it is that the conservation status will be revoked in favor of resource extraction.”

Read more about the pair’s work in the recent profile in Colossal: www.thisiscolossal.com/2018/01/ecuadorian-fungi/

Check out Newman’s photos from the trip at citizen science website Mushroom Observer: http://mushroomobserver.org/observer/observation_search?page=11&pattern=%22los+cedros%22

An up-close look at a xylobotryum fungus. (Sarah Northrop/Emerald)

View some of Newman’s photos below:

The article originally misstated that Newman’s photos were from a photo archive. It has been updated to reflect the correct location of the photos online, a citizen science website called Mushroom Observer.

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Daniela Cárdenas-Riumalló has always had a creative spirit. Surrounded by artistic minds — her grandmother was a painter, her dad a classical Latin musician, her mom a contemporary dancer — she said she could feel something inside her pushing her towards art.

“I never felt like it was an obligation to go into art,” Cárdenas said. “I felt I needed to be there because my voice was strongest to do art.”

Her show, “Interno”, is entering its final month on display on the second floor of the Erb Memorial Union. Doubling as her senior thesis project, it is a culmination of her growth as an artist during her time pursuing a BFA in painting from the University of Oregon, which she received in 2017.

“I was just listening to the news, listening to what was around me at the time when I started it,” Cárdenas said, “I was questioning how my own labels as a female, Latina — how can all these labels intertwine, how can I jump within them. Am I picking these labels because they are there or are they thrust upon me? How do I acknowledge them?”

To express these intersecting identities, Cárdenas literally sewed fabric into her paintings to mesh with the abstract shapes and lines that all seem to have a mind of their own. Bright blocks of color jump out from the dull grey background of her paintings, not unlike a neon rain jacket against the overcast Oregon sky.

Details of ‘Salta,’ part of Daniela Cárdenas-Riumalló’s ‘Interno’ exhibit in the EMU. (Sarah Northrop/Emerald)

“The paintings themselves have an initial idea, but they can transform into something else,” she said. “Just like everyone transforms into something else when they’re exposed to a different culture. Their identity kind of flexes and new terminology is thrown to you.”

Completing “Interno” was not without adversity. One of the hardest things Cárdenas had to recognize was when the project was finished. At some point, she said she had to let the artwork speak for itself.

“Once it’s on a wall, it has to do its own thing,” Cárdenas said. “I’m not there to explain anything. The statement is there which helps the viewer, but as well I want [the viewer] to struggle within themselves: what do they discover, what do they enjoy through it?”

Cárdenas said that her style changed since attending UO, especially under the tutelage of Laura Vanderberg, associate professor of painting, and Jane Reaves, senior instructor of drawing and painting.

Daniela Cárdenas-Riumalló reflects on her work. (Sarah Northrop/Emerald)

“They really made me contemplate, like, am I done [with a painting]?” she said, “Am I doing too much? Am I going crazy, you know?”

UO was not the only influence on Cárdenas’ style, though. Born in Chile, her family moved to Springfield, Oregon, when she was 10-years old. She said she struggled at first to speak English and to assimilate into U.S. culture.

“There are still ‘I’m not used to that’ things,” Cárdenas said. “Sarcastic things I can’t understand for my life. In Spanish, you take the word how it is.”

Currently, Cárdenas teaches glasswork in the EMU’s craft center. She enjoys developing her students’ creative spark and seeing their sense of accomplishment when they finish a project, but, Cárdenas said she will always be doing paintings.

“My heart will always be [with painting],” she said.

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In this episode of Spotlight on Science, arts and culture writer Frankie Lewis speaks with Win McLaughlin, a Ph.D. Candidate studying vertebrate paleontology at the University of Oregon. The two discuss McLaughlin’s latest work in Kyrgyzstan, the mysteries surrounding earth’s polarity, her motivations for being a geologist and how one gets to name a new species.

Spotlight on Science is a series from the Emerald Podcast Network designed to spark conversations across disciplines with researchers at the University of Oregon, bringing in researchers to discuss their work in a way that is understandable to everyone.

This episode was produced by Alec Cowan. Our theme song is “Zombie Disco” by Six Umbrellas.

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