By Matthew Muir | Staff Writer
Baylor University President Linda Livingstone gave a short speech at the reception for Baylor Libraries’ 2019 Creations exhibit. The reception honors the faculty, staff and graduate students whose work is featured in the exhibit.
Creations began in the fall of 1996 as Baylor Authors and Artists at Work. The yearly exhibit expanded eligibility to include all scholarly works from faculty and staff in 2002, and rebranded to Creations in 2004. The 2019 exhibit also features work from graduate students and the addition of a brand-new touchscreen TV on the wall behind the displays, adding a new level of depth and flexibility to the works on display.
This year’s Creations exhibit features more than 200 items from a myriad of Baylor’s schools and departments, and includes books, articles, artwork, music, documentaries, theater works and more. Dr. Livingstone highlighted the broad diversity of the display.
“[These items] represent a diverse, broad form of scholarship,” Livingstone said. “You will see much, much diversity here from representatives across the broad spectrum of what we do here at Baylor.”
Livingstone also shared how Creations ties into Baylor’s Illuminate initiative, describing Creations as part of the “journey” towards making Baylor one of the top research universities in the country.
“We spent a lot of time at [last week’s Board of Regents] meeting talking about both the scholarly and research work we have to do to become an R1 institution,” Livingstone said. “It’s this kind of work that helps us get there.”
Livingstone ended her speech by thanking the contributors and library staff who made Creations possible.
Faculty in attendance shared Livingstone’s enthusiasm for the exhibit. Melvin Schuetz, co-producer of the featured documentary “Chesley Bonestell: A Brush with the Future” and assistant to the curators at Armstrong Browning Library and Museum, shared his praise.
“It’s a wonderful example for us to see the creative works, books, papers, films and so on that our Baylor students, faculty and staff have produced,” Schuetz said.
2019 isn’t Schuetz’s first time having his work featured. His prior works about Chesley Bonestell have been featured in 1999 and 2001.
While the scope of the 2019 Creations exhibit is undoubtedly far-reaching, there’s still room for improvement. Christina Chan-Park, Baylor’s science librarian, notes a lack of representation from some fields.
“This year there is a dearth of STEM,” Chan-Park said. “I would say this is probably only ten or 15 percent of what actually gets published.”
The common thread among those in attendance was a desire to see the Creations exhibit continue to grow in the future.
“It would be nice… to actually get a full representation of the research that’s going on at the University,” Chan-Park said.
Schuetz shared a similar sentiment and said the more participation the better.
