Cela fait 5 ans que OCH n'est pas venu ici pour la dernière fois. Cette fois à Paris-Orly, en essayant d'éviter l'enfer de Charles-de-Gaulle. À côté de la porte, un fumoir présente un scénario très familier de dragons errants, mais cette fois-ci contenu. La dame des billets de train semble également familière, ou du moins sa mince patience. Assis près de la fenêtre, de nouveaux visages entrent dans la voiture et d'anciennes gares défilent avec leurs escaliers en fer - cela rappelle presque New York. En arrivant à la Gare du Nord, les vénérables statues surplombent sereinement la ville. Les cafés sont toujours là aussi, avec leurs chaises alignées à l'extérieur et donnant sur la rue. C'est une ville où les gens viennent pour regarder.
It's been 5 years since OCH last flew here. This time at Paris-Orly, trying to avoid the hell of Charles-de-Gaulle. Next to the gate, a smoking room displays a very familiar scenario of wandering dragons, only this time contained. The train ticket lady also sounds familiar, or at least her slim patience does. Sitting by the window, new faces enter the carriage, and old stations pass by with their iron stairs - it almost reminds of New York. Arriving at Gare du Nord, the venerable statues calmly overlook the city. The cafes are still here too, with their chairs lining outside and facing the street. This is a city where people come to look.
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AWARDS
Fulbright Selection Committee
These last 2 months I had the pleasure to be serving on the Selection Committee for the Fulbright / FLAD and Fulbright / Camões I.P. grants for US students and researchers. It was very interesting to read about exciting research in the most varied fields, but even more interesting, and heart warming, was to see how coming to Portugal played a crucial role in their academic and personal lives, and the lives of those they want to engage with, on both sides of the Atlantic ocean. Now in its almost 80 years of existence, the Fulbright Program continues to be a much needed opportunity to promote cross-cultural understanding and meaningful connections.
EVENTS
Community.quantumland.art at ICIT15
To celebrate the 15th Anniversary of the PhD in Integrated Composition, Improvisation, and Technology (ICIT) at UCI, I delivered the english (and only slightly changed) version of my presentation about the Community. This took place on the past March 9th, but I also recorded and shared it on youtube.
This Wednesday, on the 20th at 2pm, I will be leading The QAC Toolkit crashcourseat IRCAM Forum Workshops 2024, in Paris, France. This is the 30th Anniversary edition and you can see its full program here. Though my workshop at Salle Nono may be in person only, I will be saving the patches we create throughout it on this repo. But please, if you are in Paris, reach out and say hi!
IAGAN Seminary at Paris 8
Later this week, on the 22nd at 2pm, I will be delivering a talk at Université Paris 8, invited by Professor Alain Lioret, on his IAGAN Seminary (Intelligences Artificielles et Générativités en Art Numérique). My talk, titled "On Music and Painting, and Quantum Computing", will be a part of the Session Spéciale Art Quantique which will take place at room A2 204. This session is both in person and online.
My workshop on introduction to Github, project management, and collaboration is now live online for anyone to watch on-demand. This workshop starts from complete zero, and guides the attendees through their first issues and commits. At the very end there is a special challenge that is still open: it involves using all the skills taught during the workshop and figuring out how to complete a pull request to the original repo's hall of fame ;) This workshop is on youtube (btw I need 8 more subscribers in order to be able to stream) but if you open the first part through the link on the workshop page, it can open the video on a vertical popup window that can be always visible while completing the tasks.
CEIS20, the research center that hosts me at University of Coimbra (UC), has its own PhD program in Contemporary Studies (DEC). The deadline for first round of applications to graduate programs here is April 1st - as I understand, there are other rounds one can enter to apply for a graduate program here. On the other news, there is also an upcoming non-degree postgraduate course that I am involved with at UC, on Quantum Computing and Quantum Technologies. If you'd like to interact with me, feel free to reach out.