While Lisa Kori Chung ’09 finishes up her yearlong voyage around the world, Allison Swaim ’10 is just beginning hers. Both are Oberlin Watson fellows granted a year to passionately research individual projects, all the while amassing information and documentation, and creating as they travel. 

Chung working on her project

Chung’s project involves researching the world of electronic art in order to better understand technologies and the people who are actively shaping her experience and perception of them. Countries that Chung has traveled to include Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, and Spain. Photos from her voyage can be seen here. Learn more about what she saw, heard, and created at her blog.

Swaim working on her project

Swaim’s project involves traveling trade routes by cargo ship (which move 90% of the world’s freight) to document the lives of modern-day sailors in order to put a human face to the global trade industry. During August she traveled across the Atlantic in a bulker with 25,000 tons of wheat and 21 Polish sailors and is currently in Sweden. She is planning on heading east next, possibly to China. Her Transom blog, will be updated shortly with documentation of her voyage thus far.