Library Showcase Winners Announced

Mural on a building showing people behind a waving D.C. flag, in a screen cap from the Downloading Statehood video

Every fall and spring semester, the Library takes delight in sharing a variety of creative works submitted by members of the Georgetown Community to the Library Showcase. We are highlighting 17 projects from Fall 2019, including videos and podcasts created using software and spaces in the Gelardin New Media Center, laser-cut and 3-D printed objects made in the Maker Hub, and a research paper written about manuscripts and archives found in the Booth Family Center for Special Collections. Three projects were selected to receive $50 Amazon gift cards as the winners of the Voters’ Choice, Library Staff Pick, and the Beeck Center Awards for the Fall 2019 semester.

The Voters’ Choice Award goes to the Europe Desk Podcast, which received the highest number of votes from the Georgetown community. The Europe Desk is a podcast from the BMW Center for German and European Studies at Georgetown University. It brings together leading experts working on the most pertinent issues facing Europe and transatlantic relations today. Made using Gelardin equipment, the team produced 16 interview-based episodes in their first season. Listeners all over the world have downloaded the podcast over 4,500 times since it launched in August 2019. In addition to using Gelardin microphones to record the interviews, the creators attended a library podcasting workshop and worked with former Gelardin Operations Coordinator, Noah Bickford.

The Staff Pick goes to Lucinda Zhu for her Georgetown Laser Journals. Lucinda worked with Maker Hub Manager Don Undeen to design covers for each of Georgetown’s four undergraduate schools, and another for the whole campus. She used Illustrator to create the designs and the VLS 4.60 laser cutter to engrave and cut medium-density fiberboard into beautiful journal covers. This project was inspired by Lauinger Library’s 50th anniversary, when the Maker Hub was asked to create personalized commemorative gifts.

The Beeck Center Award for Social Impact + Innovation goes to Professor Matthew Pavesich’s video Downloading Statehood, which builds on the DC/Adapters project, a digital archive of the ways that people use and adapt the DC flag. The video Downloading Statehood addresses this phenomenon and invites Washingtonians to make creative use of the flag even more—and more visibly—in service of activism for DC statehood.

Beeck Center judges appreciated how Professor Pavesich’s video ties international concepts to our local context, advocates for social impact through artistic expression, shows a number of creative ways policies can be impacted, and reminds us that art is both a powerful and overlooked tool of scaling a message.

Honorable mention goes to these outstanding works:

Congratulations to the winners! We hope these projects will inspire others to take advantage of the many scholarly resources, creative tools, and expertise provided by the Library. Please spend some time viewing all of the accepted projects or fill out this form to submit a project to the Spring 2020 showcase.