TI and UC Berkeley encourage creativity through bringing art to engineering

DALLAS, Sept. 10, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley), and Texas Instruments Inc. (TI) (NASDAQ: TXN) today will co-host a dedication ceremony for a new work of art commissioned from the Weeds series by fine arts photographer and filmmaker Lekha Singh. The large scale photograph, measuring 8 x 12 feet and printed on brushed aluminum is part of a series that portrays wild weeds around the world, illuminating the often overlooked beauty in everyday objects. The piece, which will be housed in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences (EECS) at UC Berkeley, is intended to inspire creativity and a different viewpoint among engineering students toward complex global problems.

"Artists and engineers are similar in that they are makers who turn the ordinary into the extraordinary," said Steve Lyle, TI's director of Engineering Workforce Development and University Marketing. "It's TI's hope that Lekha Singh's photography will motivate Berkeley engineering students to use their imaginations to explore the unknown, to look beyond the obvious, and to be inspired by what can be instead of what is impossible."

Through this installation, both TI and Berkeley emphasize that art and engineering are not mutually exclusive. While engineering explores how things work, artists explore why society should care. By juxtaposing Singh's transcendent artwork against the technical backdrop of hands-on engineering labs, it is the hope of both TI and UC Berkeley that the complementary nature of the two disciplines, engineering and the arts, will be more apparent and will motivate students to solve real-world problems through curiosity and creative thinking.

"Art and engineering are harmonious partners," said Tsu-Jae King Liu, chair of the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences at UC Berkeley. "TI and Berkeley have worked together closely for a number of years to ensure a hands-on education for engineering students, and I'm excited about the message we send today – that art and engineering can come together to engender unexpected thinking toward intricate challenges."

"Lekha Singh, a former TI contract employee in the 1980s, demonstrates through her body of work what can be accomplished when one sets out to make a positive difference in the world," said Lyle. "She is a shining example of how innovation is fueled through diversity in all of its forms, including different points of view and experiences told through her artwork."

About Lekha Singh

Lekha Singh's work knows no international boundaries and explores the capacity to recognize the familiar in the foreign, the strange, the obscure and spans multiple countries, cultures, and ecosystems around the globe. Her major exhibitions — Created Equal, Nomadic Camera, African Journeys, and The Other Half: Women in Focus — have been shown in museums and galleries throughout the United States. For more information on Singh's "Weeds series," please visit www.nomadiccamera.com.

About Texas Instruments

Texas Instruments Incorporated (TI) is a global semiconductor design and manufacturing company that develops analog ICs and embedded processors. By employing the world's brightest minds, TI creates innovations that shape the future of technology. TI is helping more than 100,000 customers transform the future, today. Learn more at www.ti.com/university.

About UC Berkeley EECS

Part of the mission of the Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences department at UC Berkeley is to educate future leaders through a rigorous curriculum of theory and application that develops student ability to solve problems individually and in teams.  Its undergraduate and graduate EECS programs rank in the top three nationwide and attract researchers and students from around the world. Similar to Singh's artwork, Berkeley's EECS program has a strong tradition of collaboration that breaks down disciplinary and organizational boundaries. For more information, please visit www.eecs.berkeley.edu

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