Cut Pathways

In 1976, punk started making headlines in New York and England, and by 1977, punk was central to a growing community of Pittsburghers in the neighborhood of Oakland. The punk scene spanned communities. The riotous onslaught of earnestly played guitars ringed through houses, bars, and the halls of Carnegie Mellon and the University of Pittsburgh. Flyers sprung up on telephone polls. At Pittsburgh Filmmakers, 8mm cameras brought in a...

In 1975, Sally Dixon left the Carnegie Museum of Art. But Bill Judson took over the Film Section, expanded the program’s offerings, and introduced video art into the galleries. Judson guided the program until it was shuttered in 2003. In this episode, we zoom in on certain details of this era. Graphic designer Maria Paul Kyros discusses the process of designing the Film Section posters. Lindsay Mattock and Ben Ogrodnik discuss the ...

Carnegie Mellon is often a place where art and technology meet. This episode looks at two such instances. In the late 1960s, Duane Palyka was writing programs for a Bendix G-20 computer to make art. Layers of text characters creating sweeping vector-like printed images. A decade later, computer scientist Roger Dannenberg arrived on campus. He quickly co-founded the Computer Music Project, developed MIDI-based software, and later co...

The Buchla synthesizer experienced a cultural reemergence through new records from composers Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith and Suzanne Ciani, but for Pittsburgh, the Buchla first arrived in 1969 when composer Morton Subotnick founded the University of Pittsburgh’s Electronic Music Studio. This episode charts the studio’s history from analog to digital. We hear stories about complications with CBS Musical Instruments, a lost George Romero f...

Renowned sculptor Selma Burke arrived in Pittsburgh in the late 1960s to found the Selma Burke Art Center, an important hub for arts in East Liberty. With classes, lectures, and performances, the SBAC was an important meeting place for youth, local artists, and visiting creators. While not in Oakland, the SBAC is tied to our story through its funders, the Mellon Trust and the Carnegie Institute. This is the story of the Selma Burke...

Initially an offshoot of the Film Section, Pittsburgh Filmmakers became one of the first and largest media arts centers in the U.S., fostering a community dedicated to experimental film and photography. The organization began as an equipment in the Carnegie Museum of Art, then found space in the basement of the Selma Burke Art Center. A more permanent location was found in the Oakland neighborhood. Some call Filmmakers in the 1970s...

Avant-garde cinema found an unlikely home in the Pittsburgh neighborhood of Oakland. DIY screening events at the Crumbling Wall and New Cinema Workshop led to Sally Dixon founding the Film Section at the Carnegie Museum of Art. Throughout the 1970s and for decades after, filmmakers like Stan Brakhage, Carolee Schneemann, Hollis Frampton, and Werner Herzog visited the city, screening their films and lecturing about their work. This ...

“Steel City Outsiders and the Institutional Avant-Garde,” the third season of Cut Pathways, a podcast produced by the Carnegie Mellon University Oral History Program, investigates the history of avant-garde arts organizations and communities in Pittsburgh’s Oakland neighborhood in and around the 1970s. 

In the 1970s, Oakland emerged as an unlikely center for avant-garde arts. Pittsburgh prided itself on its blue-collared nature, a ...

“The Wild West of Computing” Live! An Oral History Podcast Performance from Cut Pathways Created by the Carnegie Mellon University Oral History Program in the University Libraries

This episode is a live recording of an event held on April 7. Hosts Katherine Barbera and David Bernabo take you on a 68-minute journey through the fascinating history of computer science at Carnegie Mellon. Hear voices like Raj Reddy, Jesse Quatse, and S...

The second season of Cut Pathways, the oral history podcast from the Carnegie Mellon University Oral History Program, dives into the influential history of computer science at CMU. In a six-episode series, titled “The Wild West of Computing,” hosts Katherine Barbera and David Bernabo along with guests historian Andrew Meade McGee and Curator of Special Collections Sam Lemley show how the culture surrounding computer science signifi...

The second season of Cut Pathways, the oral history podcast from the Carnegie Mellon University Oral History Program, dives into the influential history of computer science at CMU. In a six-episode series, titled “The Wild West of Computing,” hosts Katherine Barbera and David Bernabo along with guests historian Andrew Meade McGee and Curator of Special Collections Sam Lemley show how the culture surrounding computer science signifi...

The second season of Cut Pathways, the oral history podcast from the Carnegie Mellon University Oral History Program, dives into the influential history of computer science at CMU. In a six-episode series, titled “The Wild West of Computing,” hosts Katherine Barbera and David Bernabo along with guests historian Andrew Meade McGee and Curator of Special Collections Sam Lemley show how the culture surrounding computer science signifi...

The second season of Cut Pathways, the oral history podcast from the Carnegie Mellon University Oral History Program, dives into the influential history of computer science at CMU. In a six-episode series, titled “The Wild West of Computing,” hosts Katherine Barbera and David Bernabo along with guests historian Andrew Meade McGee and Curator of Special Collections Sam Lemley show how the culture surrounding computer science signifi...

The second season of Cut Pathways, the oral history podcast from the Carnegie Mellon University Oral History Program, dives into the influential history of computer science at CMU. In a six-episode series, titled “The Wild West of Computing,” hosts Katherine Barbera and David Bernabo along with guests historian Andrew Meade McGee and Curator of Special Collections Sam Lemley show how the culture surrounding computer science signifi...

The second season of Cut Pathways, the oral history podcast from the Carnegie Mellon University Oral History Program, dives into the influential history of computer science at CMU. In a six-episode series, titled “The Wild West of Computing,” hosts Katherine Barbera and David Bernabo along with guests historian Andrew Meade McGee and Curator of Special Collections Sam Lemley show how the culture surrounding computer science signifi...