Rhonda Roland Shearer
Encyclopedia
Rhonda Roland Shearer is an American sculptor, scholar and journalist, who founded the nonprofit organization Art Science Research Laboratory with her late husband Stephen Jay Gould
. The mission statement avows that the lab aims to "infuse intellectual rigor and critical thinking in disciplines that range from Academics to Journalism. ASRL researches conventional beliefs and misinformation and transmits its findings by means of scientific methods and state-of-the-art computer technologies."
, Los Angeles
and London
, as well as smaller cities throughout the United States. One of her works reflected her feminist principles by calling attention to the gender
disparity in the public art
that New York City commissions. Of the hundreds of monuments erected in the city, she emphasized, only three depict real women: Gertrude Stein
, Eleanor Roosevelt
and Joan of Arc
. In the traveling museum exhibition catalogue, Shearer described her exhibition "Woman's Work" by writing, "I depicted large scale images of motherhood and housework in heroic size, as are our most sacred monuments." The New York Times profiled the exhibit in an article "Celebrating Heroines of Drudgery".
In 1996, she exhibited Shapes Of Nature, 10 Years Of Bronze Sculptures in The New York Botanical Garden, which experimented in the use of fractals as a new way to look at space and form. Whereas many mathematicians like Benoit Mandelbrot
understood fractals in the form of computerized models of equations, others like Nathaniel Friedman and Shearer recognized that fractals are also found in nature. The Economist
quoted her as saying, "For the artists, nothing is more fundamental."
Always fascinated by the intersection between science and art, Shearer exhibited Pangea -- inspired by chaos theory
-- in New York and Los Angeles from 1990-1991.
's supposedly "readymade
" works of art were actually created by Duchamp. Research that Shearer published in 1997, "Marcel Duchamp's Impossible Bed and Other 'Not' Readymade Objects: A Possible Route of Influence From Art To Science", lays out these arguments. In the paper, she showed that research of items like snow shovels and bottle racks in use at the time failed to turn up any identical matches to photographs of the originals. However, there are accounts of Walter Arensberg
and Joseph Stella
being with Duchamp when he purchased the original Fountain at J. L. Mott Iron Works. Such investigations are hampered by the fact that few of the original "readymades" survive, having been lost or destroyed. Those that exist today are predominantly reproductions Duchamp authorized or designed in the final two decades of his life. Shearer also asserts that the artwork L.H.O.O.Q., a poster-copy of the Mona Lisa
with a moustache drawn on it, is not the true Mona Lisa, but Duchamp's own slightly-different version that he modelled partly after himself. The inference of Shearer's viewpoint is that Duchamp was creating an even larger joke than he admitted.
websites StinkyJournalism.org and CheckYourFacts.org. Both websites use the scientific method
to critique the mainstream media and uncover hoaxes.
" was, in fact, a hoax. "Monster Pig", also known as "Hogzilla
II" and "Pigzilla", is the name of a large domestic farm-raised pig
that was shot during a canned hunt
on May 3, 2007, by an eleven-year-old boy, Jamison Stone. The location is disclosed as a 150 acre (0.607029 km²) low fence enclosure within the larger 2500 acres (1,011.7 ha) commercial hunting preserve called Lost Creek Plantation, outside Anniston, Alabama
, USA. According to the hunters (there were no independent witnesses), the pig weighed 1,051 lb (477 kg).
Several days after the story broke, suspicion mounted over the authenticity of the photographic evidence. StinkyJournalism.org interviewed a retired New York University physicist, Dr. Richard Brandt, who used perspective geometry to measure the photograph and showed that, as represented, the pig would be 15 ft (4.57 m) long—much larger than the 9 in 4 in (2.84 m) claimed. Brandt's measurements also showed that the boy in the photo was standing several metres behind the pig, creating the optical illusion that the animal was larger than its actual size. Others claim the photographs were digitally altered.
StinkyJournalism.org discovered that although the Lost Creek Plantation web site boasted that the hunting there was "legendary", the operation was only four months old at the time of the hunt. Eddy Borden had big plans for developing his canned-hunt operation, the Clay County Times reported shortly before the hunt.
In the aftermath of the story, an Alabama grand jury investigated the 11-year-old aspiring sharpshooter Jamison Stone on animal cruelty charges, along with his father Mike Stone, expedition leaders Keith O'Neal and Charles Williams, and Lost Creek Plantation grounds owner Eddy Borden.
The article ("Exclusive: Grand jury to investigate 'monster pig' kill") revealed information subpoenaed by the Clay County District Attorney Fred Thompson, which includes hundreds of hours of on-the-record interviews and research by StinkyJournalism.org director Rhonda Roland Shearer.
after the latter published the controversial book on the September 11, 2001, attacks, American Ground: Unbuilding the World Trade Center. Using forensic evidence, Shearer criticized the author's troubling claims that the FDNY looted jeans from the wreckage of Ground Zero
.
The Observer quotes Shearer as saying that "she has sent both Farrar, Straus and Giroux and The Atlantic Monthly a 33-page blow-by-blow rebuttal of 56 facts and statements in the three-part magazine article that was the basis of the book. In it, the authors of the rebuttal — Ms. Shearer and a group of New York City firemen, Port Authority and NYPD officers, construction workers and family members of the victims — write: 'Throughout his articles, Mr. Langewiesche continuously uses slanderous innuendo to denigrate uniformed rescue personnel and construction workers. Such statements are libelous.'"
published in The New York Observer on February 16, 2004 critical of the 9/11 Commission
.
"To publicly accuse parties of potential criminal wrongdoing is serious and damaging. That the accusations were based on facts that were only later checked and proven wrong is especially egregious," Shearer wrote in the report. "The 9/11 Commission and specifically [Executive Director] Philip Zelikow were defamed."
Stephen Jay Gould
Stephen Jay Gould was an American paleontologist, evolutionary biologist, and historian of science. He was also one of the most influential and widely read writers of popular science of his generation....
. The mission statement avows that the lab aims to "infuse intellectual rigor and critical thinking in disciplines that range from Academics to Journalism. ASRL researches conventional beliefs and misinformation and transmits its findings by means of scientific methods and state-of-the-art computer technologies."
Sculpture
As a sculptor, her work has been exhibited in New YorkNew York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
, Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
and London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, as well as smaller cities throughout the United States. One of her works reflected her feminist principles by calling attention to the gender
Gender
Gender is a range of characteristics used to distinguish between males and females, particularly in the cases of men and women and the masculine and feminine attributes assigned to them. Depending on the context, the discriminating characteristics vary from sex to social role to gender identity...
disparity in the public art
Public art
The term public art properly refers to works of art in any media that have been planned and executed with the specific intention of being sited or staged in the physical public domain, usually outside and accessible to all...
that New York City commissions. Of the hundreds of monuments erected in the city, she emphasized, only three depict real women: Gertrude Stein
Gertrude Stein
Gertrude Stein was an American writer, poet and art collector who spent most of her life in France.-Early life:...
, Eleanor Roosevelt
Eleanor Roosevelt
Anna Eleanor Roosevelt was the First Lady of the United States from 1933 to 1945. She supported the New Deal policies of her husband, distant cousin Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and became an advocate for civil rights. After her husband's death in 1945, Roosevelt continued to be an international...
and Joan of Arc
Joan of Arc
Saint Joan of Arc, nicknamed "The Maid of Orléans" , is a national heroine of France and a Roman Catholic saint. A peasant girl born in eastern France who claimed divine guidance, she led the French army to several important victories during the Hundred Years' War, which paved the way for the...
. In the traveling museum exhibition catalogue, Shearer described her exhibition "Woman's Work" by writing, "I depicted large scale images of motherhood and housework in heroic size, as are our most sacred monuments." The New York Times profiled the exhibit in an article "Celebrating Heroines of Drudgery".
In 1996, she exhibited Shapes Of Nature, 10 Years Of Bronze Sculptures in The New York Botanical Garden, which experimented in the use of fractals as a new way to look at space and form. Whereas many mathematicians like Benoit Mandelbrot
Benoît Mandelbrot
Benoît B. Mandelbrot was a French American mathematician. Born in Poland, he moved to France with his family when he was a child...
understood fractals in the form of computerized models of equations, others like Nathaniel Friedman and Shearer recognized that fractals are also found in nature. The Economist
The Economist
The Economist is an English-language weekly news and international affairs publication owned by The Economist Newspaper Ltd. and edited in offices in the City of Westminster, London, England. Continuous publication began under founder James Wilson in September 1843...
quoted her as saying, "For the artists, nothing is more fundamental."
Always fascinated by the intersection between science and art, Shearer exhibited Pangea -- inspired by chaos theory
Chaos theory
Chaos theory is a field of study in mathematics, with applications in several disciplines including physics, economics, biology, and philosophy. Chaos theory studies the behavior of dynamical systems that are highly sensitive to initial conditions, an effect which is popularly referred to as the...
-- in New York and Los Angeles from 1990-1991.
Art history
As an art historian, Shearer posited that many of Marcel DuchampMarcel Duchamp
Marcel Duchamp was a French artist whose work is most often associated with the Dadaist and Surrealist movements. Considered by some to be one of the most important artists of the 20th century, Duchamp's output influenced the development of post-World War I Western art...
's supposedly "readymade
Found art
The term found art—more commonly found object or readymade—describes art created from undisguised, but often modified, objects that are not normally considered art, often because they already have a non-art function...
" works of art were actually created by Duchamp. Research that Shearer published in 1997, "Marcel Duchamp's Impossible Bed and Other 'Not' Readymade Objects: A Possible Route of Influence From Art To Science", lays out these arguments. In the paper, she showed that research of items like snow shovels and bottle racks in use at the time failed to turn up any identical matches to photographs of the originals. However, there are accounts of Walter Arensberg
Walter Arensberg
Walter Conrad Arensberg was an American art collector, critic and poet. His father was part owner and president of a crucible steel company. He majored in English and philosophy at Harvard University...
and Joseph Stella
Joseph Stella
Joseph Stella was an Italian-born, American Futurist painter best known for his depictions of industrial America. He is associated with the American Precisionism movement of the 1910s-1940s....
being with Duchamp when he purchased the original Fountain at J. L. Mott Iron Works. Such investigations are hampered by the fact that few of the original "readymades" survive, having been lost or destroyed. Those that exist today are predominantly reproductions Duchamp authorized or designed in the final two decades of his life. Shearer also asserts that the artwork L.H.O.O.Q., a poster-copy of the Mona Lisa
Mona Lisa
Mona Lisa is a portrait by the Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci. It is a painting in oil on a poplar panel, completed circa 1503–1519...
with a moustache drawn on it, is not the true Mona Lisa, but Duchamp's own slightly-different version that he modelled partly after himself. The inference of Shearer's viewpoint is that Duchamp was creating an even larger joke than he admitted.
 |
Journalism and media ethics
Art Science Research Laboratory also operates the media ethicsMedia ethics
Media ethics is the subdivision of applied ethics dealing with the specific ethical principles and standards of media, including broadcast media, film, theatre, the arts, print media and the internet...
websites StinkyJournalism.org and CheckYourFacts.org. Both websites use the scientific method
Scientific method
Scientific method refers to a body of techniques for investigating phenomena, acquiring new knowledge, or correcting and integrating previous knowledge. To be termed scientific, a method of inquiry must be based on gathering empirical and measurable evidence subject to specific principles of...
to critique the mainstream media and uncover hoaxes.
Monster Pig
StinkyJournalism.org gained widespread media attention after it uncovered evidence that the shooting of a "Monster PigMonster Pig
Monster Pig was a controversial 2007 story that initially ran in the news media as a report of an eleven-year-old boy shooting a giant feral pig. The pig was claimed to have been shot during a hunt on May 3, 2007 by an eleven-year-old boy named Jamison Stone...
" was, in fact, a hoax. "Monster Pig", also known as "Hogzilla
Hogzilla
Hogzilla is the name given to a male hybrid of wild hog and domestic pig that was shot and killed in Alapaha, Georgia, United States, on June 17, 2004 by Dr. Eliahu Katz on Ken Holyoak's fish farm and hunting reserve. It was alleged to be long and weighed over . It was originally considered a...
II" and "Pigzilla", is the name of a large domestic farm-raised pig
Pig
A pig is any of the animals in the genus Sus, within the Suidae family of even-toed ungulates. Pigs include the domestic pig, its ancestor the wild boar, and several other wild relatives...
that was shot during a canned hunt
Canned hunt
A canned hunt is essentially a trophy hunt in which the animal is kept in a more confined area, such as in a fenced-in area, increasing the likelihood of the hunter obtaining a kill...
on May 3, 2007, by an eleven-year-old boy, Jamison Stone. The location is disclosed as a 150 acre (0.607029 km²) low fence enclosure within the larger 2500 acres (1,011.7 ha) commercial hunting preserve called Lost Creek Plantation, outside Anniston, Alabama
Anniston, Alabama
Anniston is a city in Calhoun County in the state of Alabama, United States.As of the 2000 census, the population of the city is 24,276. According to the 2005 U.S. Census estimates, the city had a population of 23,741...
, USA. According to the hunters (there were no independent witnesses), the pig weighed 1,051 lb (477 kg).
Several days after the story broke, suspicion mounted over the authenticity of the photographic evidence. StinkyJournalism.org interviewed a retired New York University physicist, Dr. Richard Brandt, who used perspective geometry to measure the photograph and showed that, as represented, the pig would be 15 ft (4.57 m) long—much larger than the 9 in 4 in (2.84 m) claimed. Brandt's measurements also showed that the boy in the photo was standing several metres behind the pig, creating the optical illusion that the animal was larger than its actual size. Others claim the photographs were digitally altered.
StinkyJournalism.org discovered that although the Lost Creek Plantation web site boasted that the hunting there was "legendary", the operation was only four months old at the time of the hunt. Eddy Borden had big plans for developing his canned-hunt operation, the Clay County Times reported shortly before the hunt.
In the aftermath of the story, an Alabama grand jury investigated the 11-year-old aspiring sharpshooter Jamison Stone on animal cruelty charges, along with his father Mike Stone, expedition leaders Keith O'Neal and Charles Williams, and Lost Creek Plantation grounds owner Eddy Borden.
The article ("Exclusive: Grand jury to investigate 'monster pig' kill") revealed information subpoenaed by the Clay County District Attorney Fred Thompson, which includes hundreds of hours of on-the-record interviews and research by StinkyJournalism.org director Rhonda Roland Shearer.
William Langewiesche
As described by The New York Observer, Shearer "took on" journalist William LangewiescheWilliam Langewiesche
William Langewiesche is an American author and journalist, and was a professional airplane pilot for many years. Since 2006 he has been the international correspondent for Vanity Fair magazine.-Career:...
after the latter published the controversial book on the September 11, 2001, attacks, American Ground: Unbuilding the World Trade Center. Using forensic evidence, Shearer criticized the author's troubling claims that the FDNY looted jeans from the wreckage of Ground Zero
Ground zero
The term ground zero describes the point on the Earth's surface closest to a detonation...
.
The Observer quotes Shearer as saying that "she has sent both Farrar, Straus and Giroux and The Atlantic Monthly a 33-page blow-by-blow rebuttal of 56 facts and statements in the three-part magazine article that was the basis of the book. In it, the authors of the rebuttal — Ms. Shearer and a group of New York City firemen, Port Authority and NYPD officers, construction workers and family members of the victims — write: 'Throughout his articles, Mr. Langewiesche continuously uses slanderous innuendo to denigrate uniformed rescue personnel and construction workers. Such statements are libelous.'"
Gail Sheehy
The Art Science Research Laboratory released a 65-page report based on an article Gail SheehyGail Sheehy
Gail Sheehy is an American writer and lecturer, most notable for her books on life and the life cycle. She is also a contributor to Vanity Fair magazine....
published in The New York Observer on February 16, 2004 critical of the 9/11 Commission
9/11 Commission
The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, also known as the 9/11 Commission, was set up on November 27, 2002, "to prepare a full and complete account of the circumstances surrounding the September 11, 2001 attacks", including preparedness for and the immediate response to...
.
"To publicly accuse parties of potential criminal wrongdoing is serious and damaging. That the accusations were based on facts that were only later checked and proven wrong is especially egregious," Shearer wrote in the report. "The 9/11 Commission and specifically [Executive Director] Philip Zelikow were defamed."