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Making sparks for industry and art

Published: Jul 11 2018
Making sparks for industry and art - Photo
Welding is critical to both the energy and manufacturing industries in North Dakota. With power plants producing energy, those facilities have to be maintained 24 hours a day. "It requires the skill of welding. You also have manufacturing in this state – John Deere, Case, Caterpillar, Bobcat, Tru North Steel – that utilize welders,” said David Mozingo, assistant professor of welding at BSC. “There is a broad range of how welding touches all our lives from industry to entertainment. It is in everything we use – this chair, this building, your car, your oven, your microwave, the soldered joints that are in your computer or, if it’s formed plastic, the machine that formed it was welded together,” he said. Welding’s reach has even expanded to BSC’s Art Department.

In the process of getting his bachelor’s degree, Mozingo took an art class and really enjoyed it. “I think it’s important for our welding students to realize that welding does not have to be under the hood sweating, you can have fun with it.” So, he visited with David Lewellyn, BSC assistant professor of visual arts, and they worked to establish a sculptural welding class. “The whole purpose was integration of students, the cross pollinating. Look what else you can do. You’re here to learn more than one skill,” said Lewellyn. It began in Fall 2017 semester with eight students from the art department. “It sparked an interest. They had the artistic mind to think, ‘Can I join this material to that material?’ It challenged me,” said Mozingo.

Continue reading this story written for the Summer 2018 issue of BSC Magazine.