University of Montana fabrication laboratory puts scientific, manufacturing equipment in artists’ hands

The first Fab-Lab opened at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology decades ago, said Brad Allen, director of the UM School of Art. In 2009, he went to a conference and saw that artists’ use of manufacturing equipment wasn’t a fad but a direction, and he decided UM would invest in it.

Like the student art gallery, the lab is front and center at the entrance to the Fine Arts Building, having been built in the past two or three years.

"The message that sends is that new techniques in manufacturing and in imaging aren’t relegated to the sciences, but can also be implemented and expanded in art," Allen said.

KEILA SZPALLER [email protected]

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