Sometimes people assume that engineers aren’t creative, but this is far from the truth, as the current Apex Gallery exhibit of dinosaur marionettes shows. In his introduction to mechanical engineering course, Dr. Cristian Vargas Ordóñez (in collaboration with Matt Whitehead, Senior Instructor of Art and Director of the Apex Gallery) asked students work in teams to use the engineering concepts they were learning to create and present large dinosaur marionettes.

This project shows what’s possible within engineering education and at the intersection of arts and engineering. It’s also a great illustration of a core principle of STS, which attends to how knowledge is created. Javier Lezaun, Noortje Marres, and Manuel Tironi write that “the larger aim of STS research and intervention . . . [is] to activate new collective imaginations of what an epistemically, technically, environmentally and materially engaged polity might be.” Working together as teams to create something new is a version of this aim at the scale of a college classroom, and it’s good practice for STS thinking and for working creatively with others in other areas! (Our Creativity and Collaboration in STEM minor further reinforces these connections.)

More details about the art exhibit are included in the press release below, and the marionettes will be on display in the Apex Gallery this week, with a reception this afternoon (Wednesday, 11/19) from 4-6 pm.

---

Art Exhibit Features Giant Dinosaur Marionettes Designed by Mines Mechanical Engineering Students

RAPID CITY, SD (Nov. 19, 2025) – South Dakota Mines mechanical engineering students brought engineering and imagination together to build large dinosaur marionettes, each one crafted with a variety of materials ranging from papier-mache and fabric to metal and 3D printed parts and designed with at least two movable parts.

The creatures are now on display in the Apex Gallery in the university’s Classroom Building. The project is part of the freshman introduction to mechanical engineering course taught by Cristian Vargas Ordóñez, Ph.D., assistant professor in the Leslie A. Rose Department of Mechanical Engineering.

“The installation showcases the first design project from our mechanical engineering freshmen, where students learned foundational engineering concepts, particularly statics, by designing and building giant dinosaur marionettes,” said Vargas Ordóñez.

Working in 33 teams of three to four students each, students were given basic guidelines and a budget of $75, but the rest was up to their ingenuity.

Each puppet animates core concepts of forces, moments and equilibrium through student-designed mechanisms—linkages, pulleys, levers, and other motion systems—while also embracing storytelling, material exploration and playful expression.

“I didn’t want to constrain them,” said Vargas Ordòñez, who did a similar pilot project last spring. “I was really impressed at what the students produced and the creativity they took with the project.”

One team even partnered with the Natural History Museum in Washington, D.C., using computer-aided design to model fossil parts for their dinosaur marionette.

“The resulting creatures reveal the blend of rigor, curiosity and imagination that defines early engineering identity, transforming foundational mechanics into movement, character and joy,” said Matthew Whitehead, lecturer at Mines and director of the Apex Gallery.

Vargas Ordóñez and Whitehead collaborated on the pop-up installation, which opened last Friday, Nov. 14, with a reception at 4 p.m. today, Wednesday, Nov. 19.

The next installation at the gallery will be the second annual Zinefest 2025 where students, faculty and staff will display their zines, which are small, independently published booklets. The exhibition opening is Friday, Dec. 5.