The Fire Alarm System Engineering Essay

The Fire Alarm System Engineering Essay We are living in a time that safety and security became one of the necessary requirements in all areas of life, in the middle of technology revolution which aims to make life easier and more secure, technology has been earned by man in many fields of his life, and because of that and to make places where we live, work or even relax is more secure and safe by applying a fire alarm system. As mentioned above we will design a fire alarm system which will alert user if there is an indication of a fire situation. The main aim of all manufacturers is to achieve the best and the cheapest systems. Fire alarm system is an automatic system which detects if there an indication of a fire situation by sensing temperature or sensing a smoke, which are an indications of the changing in the environment that surrounds the system. Fire alarm system can be considered as a manual system which activated by the user or an automatic system which activates by itself, or it can be considered both automatic and manual system. The general architecture of the fire systems consists of the sensors itself, the controlling device (microcontroller or personal computers or any logic circuits), and the alarm speakers (buzzers) and in some cases it may contain an auto dialling devices to call the police or the owner of the building. Fire alarm systems can provide one or more of the following: Notifies the occupants. Controls all the fire alarm components in a building. Notifies persons in the surrounding area. Summons the fire service. Project Description and Aims The main aim of this project is to design a PIC microcontroller based fire and over heat monitoring and alarm system; the system will have the ability to detect smoke and continuously measure the temperature at any desired area and display it on an LCD (liquid crystal display) screen. And when the temperature goes over a certain degree a fan will be activated in order to reduce the temperature and cool the place. But if that doesnt work and the temperature still increasing an alarm will be activated in order to alert the persons on the surrounding area and the fan will be disabled in order to reduce the opportunity of starting a fire. Also this alarm will be activated in tow more ways, either by the pull box switch which will activate the fire alarm manually or by the smoke detector that will detect any kind of smoke which is often an indication for the existence of fire. This fire system can be considered as a manual automatic system, it is based on many ways to alert people that attending in a certain place -where the system is activated for a fire situation; the first method is sensing the temperature of the area if any increasing of the temperature over a certain degree is detected by the controller it will be displayed on the LCD and the fan will be activated, if the temperature still increasing that will indicate a fire situation so the microcontroller will activate the alarm, the second method is by pulling the switch box manually by any user, and finally when the smoke sensor will detect a smoke in the environment the microcontroller will receive the read and will activate the alarm and display the result on the LCD. Main system components: PIC microcontroller as the system brain. LCD to display results from PIC microcontroller Temperature sensor to measure the air Temperature. Smoke detector detects if there a smoke in the air. Alarm which alert in the fire situation. Switch used for manually activate or deactivate system. Fan to decrease the air Temperature. 1.3 System Block Diagram: fir blo.JPG Figure (1.1) System Block Diagram PIC microcontroller as shown in the figure (1.1) is can be described as the brain of the system, which receives inputs from three parts the first one is the temperature sensor, which measure the temperature of a certain area and pass it to the PIC microcontroller which will detects the temperature whether its over a certain degree or not, if the temperature degree is less than the certain degree them PIC will display the degree on the LCD, if the temperature degree is over then the PIC microcontroller will display the temperature degree and will put the fan to work until the temperature decrease to the normal degree. But if the temperature degree still increasing then the PIC will consider a fire situation activate the system automatically including turn the fan off and will put the alarm on to alert people to a fire situation, alarm cant be put on if there is not a driving circuit PIC may not be able to turn the alarm on. The second input is from smoke detector which detects if there a smoke in the air, and send the result continuously to the PIC whether there a smoke or not. And the PIC will detect the result if there is no smoke PIC will display the result on the LCD, but if there is smoke PIC will display the result on the LCD and will turn the alarm on to alert people to a fire situation. The third input is from the switch by which user will be able to activate or deactivate the fire system manually. If the system detects a smoke or increasing in the temperature and assumed a fire situation and there is no fire the user can deactivate the system manually, and if the user find himself in a fire situation but the system hasnt detected it yet he can activate the system manually. 1.4 Plan to implement As shown in the block diagram first the LCD screen must be connected to the PIC in order to display the desired data, then the reading of the temperature sensor will be fed to the PIC microcontroller through the ADC (analog to digital) peripheral of the PIC as input then it will be processed in the PIC microcontroller so it can be displayed on the LCD screen, then we will interface the smoke detector with the PIC microcontroller and display its status on the LCD screen. After that an interface must be done through a driving circuit to activate and deactivate the siren with a control signal from the PIC microcontroller, and then to make the connection of the pull box switch. Also a driving circuit has to be implemented to control the system cooling fan from the PIC microcontroller. 1.5 Software Approach Since we are designing a PIC microcontroller based system, first we need tools to program and write the software for the PIC microcontroller, so will need to use a PIC code compiler that is efficient and easy to use, so we have chosen to use (MikroBasic) compiler. Chapter Two Theoretical Background 2.1 OVERVIEW In this chapter we are going to explain all system hard ware components and why we used them. Several hardware components are required to combine the ability of sensing the temperature degree and detecting smoke in the air with activating the system for fire l In this chapter we will introduce all the project components with a brief about each component. The project main components are: PIC microcontroller as the system brain. LCD to display results from PIC microcontroller Temperature sensor to measure the air Temperature. Smoke detector detects if there a smoke in the air. Alarm which alert in the fire situation. Switch used for manually activate or deactivate system. Fan to decrease the air Temperature. 2.2 PIC microcontroller A microcontroller is an integrated circuit consists of simple CPU which associated with support functions such as timers, serial and analog I/O, crystal oscillator, its memory is divided to ROM, RAM, EEPROM, PIC is designed for small or dedicated applications. PIC used to reduce size and cost comparing to the model that uses separated CPU, memory, and I/O devices PIC also provides a benefit of controlling non digital electronic systems. PIC became popular in both industrial developers and hobbyists thats because of the low cost availability, easy to program and reprogram with flash memory (EEPROM) capability.F:EnasyacoubPICpic_pl.jpg Figure 2.1 (PIC microcontroller) 2.2-1 Types of the PICs Pins: The Must Pins M-CLR : which mean master clear and it active high which mean this pin works using 1but if its written as M-CLR that mean it is active low works using 0, the function of this pin is to reset the PIC which mean reset to the program counter to return to the beginning of the executed code. It is the PIN no. 1 in the PIC and most of the time it is connected to the Vcc logic 1 to let the PIC work. Oscillator: It is defined as a periodic fluctuation between two things based on changing in energy, frequency at which oscillator works is usually determined by a quartz crystal which vibrates at a frequency depends on it thickness when current is applied to it. Oscillator can combine inductors, resistors, and/or capacitors to determine the frequency. There are two types of oscillator: internal oscillator, external oscillator such as quartz crystals. Power supply: The main function of power supply is to provide system with fixed voltage needed, the typical voltage for almost PICs is (5 V) which indicates that there is a limitation on the voltage, for example if the PIC was provided with (5.5-6 V) it will damage, less than (2.5 V) PIC will not work, (less than 4.5 and more than 2.5) it is a float value which mean it is not a known value for the PIC. Usually no. of power pins is 4; 2 pins are grounded (VSS), the other two are 5 volt (VDD). The Optional Pins These pins are divided into groups that are called ports. Each port has a configuration register inside the PIC and it is called TRISE register; which a data direction register that controls the direction of data (input or output) of each pin of that port. For example having TRISA cleared (0 which is the default) will configure all pins of PORTA as output. PIC Microcontroller (16F876A) which is best described as the brain of the system, this part were chosen for its convenience for the project because all the components in this project must be interfaced with each in any easy and simple approach in order to save time and effort, for instance we have used an LCD screen as a human interface to display the system status, which much is easier to connect the LCD to the PIC microcontroller rather than facing an external interfacing hardware design. 2.2-2 PIC 16F876A: PIC16F876A High-Performance RISC CPU: Only 35 single-word instructions All single-cycle instructions except for program branches, which are two-cycle. Operating speed: DC 20 MHz Clock input DC 200 ns instruction cycle. Up to 8K x 14 words of Flash Program Memory. Up to 368 x 8 bytes of Data Memory (RAM) Up to 256 x 8 bytes of EEPROM Data Memory. Those features result because of the PIC technology CMOS Technology: Low-power, high-speed Flash/EEPROM technology. Fully static design. Wide operating voltage range (2.0V to 5.5V). Commercial and Industrial temperature ranges. Low-power consumption. 2.3 Liquid Crystal Display (LCD) 2.3-1 Definition and Mechanism of LCD LCD is the short of a Liquid Crystal Display which is a thin, flat panel. LCD is an electronically displayer for information which can be a text, symbols, numbers, images or moving pictures. It can be used as a monitor for computers, TVs, gaming devices, calculators, etc. figure (3.13) shows a 16ÃÆ'-2 LCD. Character LCD Figure (2.2) LCD 2.3-2 LCD Basics: Simple LCDs consists of liquid crustal cell surrounded by conductive electrode, upper and lower glass, upper and lower polarizer, as shown on the figure. Figure 2.3 (LCD structure) LCD displays utilize two sheets of polarizing material with a liquid crystal between them. When an electric current passed through the liquid crystal causes the crystals to align. Because of that light will not be able to pass through them. Therefore, each crystal is like a shutter, either allowing light to pass through or blocking the light as you can see in figure (3.14). Because its low electrical power consumption which allows it to be used in battery powered electronic equipment it made of any number of pixels filled with liquid crystal cells, to produce image in colours or monochrome pixels must be arrayed in front of light source. Among to its lightweight construction, its portability, and its ability to be produced in much larger screen sizes than are practical construction of cathode ray tube (CRT) display technology which are LCDs major features . Also its low electrical power consumption enables it to be used in battery-powered electronic equipment. Since all the functions such as display RAM, character generator and liquid crystal driver, required for driving a dot-matrix liquid crystal display are internally provided on one chip, a minimum system can be interfaced with this controller drive. LCD (Liquid Crystal Display) screen that will be used to display the temperature and to display the status of the system, we have chosen an LCD screen since its the best way to inform the user about the system status in a friendly and simple way. 2.4 Temperature Sensor: Which is a device used to sense temperature also known as measurement temperature device. Temperature sensors can be classified into two types contact and non-contact sensors. 2.4-1 Contact sensors Which measure its own temperature as the environments temperature, by considering that the sensor and the object are at the in thermal equilibrium which means that there is no flow temperature between them. 2.4-2 Non-contact sensors Which receives thermal radiant power of infrared radiation radiates from some area, then its measure it as the temperature of that area. Temperature Sensor (LM35 DZ) this sensor has been chosen due to its high quality, sensitivity, low cost and its simple and easy output interface. Features of temperature Sensor (LM35 DZ) Calibrated directly in  ° Celsius (Centigrade) 0.5 °C accuracy Rated for full -55 ° to +150 °C range For remote applications this sensor is suitable It can operate from 4 to 30 volts The current drain is less than 60  µA 2.5 Smoke Detector Its been used to detect smoke in the air and fed back the result to the system. There are two methods to detect smoke in the air: Photoelectric method which also called optical detection. By emitting electronics from a matter such as liquid metals or gases that from electromagnetic radiation electrons energy would be absorptive, then the emitted electronics will be detected by the detector. The process is done as a light beam which goes in front to the light sensor in the case of no smoke, but if there smoke light will reflect in angles then light beams will be scattered to the light sensor which will consider it as a smoke setuation. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f5/Photoelectric_effect.svg/275px-Photoelectric_effect.svg.png http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/49/OpticalSmokeDetector.png/250px-OpticalSmokeDetector.png Ionization by converting an ion into molecule by removing or adding charges electrons. The principle of this method is that a chamber which includes two electrodes with air between them and there is a small constant current will be permitted but if there a smoke enters the ionic chamber then the small current will be interrupted which will indicate a fire situation. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/6/68/Smokealarm.JPG/250px-Smokealarm.JPG http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smoke_detector 2.6 Switch This is an electrical device used to pass or not pass current. It is used to activate the system manually by any user in any emergency case. Or deactivate the system manually by the user in if the system activate automatically and there is no emergency case. 2.7 Buzzer or siren Is also called a beeper which is an electronic device which consists number of sensors or switches, has many applications such as car horn, clock alarm etc That is used to inform the persons at the surrounding area and notify them about status of the fire alarm system. 2.8 Driving circuit Which is an electrical circuit by which an electronic device can control another device, driving circuit for example can be used to amplify current.

Tourism in the Algarve

Albufeira, located in the heart of Algarve, is one of the main tourist spots (if not the most tourist-intensive spot) in the whole of Portugal. Albufeira is famed for its pristine beaches, which are situated at the center of the Algarve coastline, and its unusual cliff and rock formations. Flights to the airport in Faro—about 30 km from Albufeira—are cheap, making it accessible for a wide range of budgets.Albufeira actually consists of two sections: The â€Å"old† Albufeira, which is a fishing port with old Algarvian narrow streets and whitewashed structures; and the â€Å"new† Albufeira, which is made up of more recent developments growing around the old section.For accommodations, there are plenty to choose from ranging from hotels to apartelles to campsites. One can rent mobile homes in Albufeira Camping—a value-for-money alternative to hotels.Albufeira offers a lot of choices for the beach-goer. Within a span of 5 km, you can find the Praia de B aleerira in the new marina, the Praia do Peneco and Praia dos Pescadores (which are two beaches near the fishing town), and other equally charming beaches such as Praia dos Alamà £es, Praia do Inatel, Praia das Areias de Sao Joà £o, Praia dos Aveiros, and Praia da Oura. Other beaches are also easily accessible from the town.Albufeira is also famous for its nightlife. Bars, discos, and nightclubs abound â€Å"The Strip† in Albufeira’s Montechoro section. Local restaurants serve seafood specialties such as cataplana (steamed shellfish) and caldeirada (fish stew).Restaurants specializing in various chicken dishes are also popular. Other sights of interest include: Churches in various stages of disrepair and the Archaeological Museum that contains relics from Albufeira’s colorful past.AlmancilAlmancil, a small market town located northwest of Faro, is famous as a center for two luxury beach resorts and residential developments along the Algarve, namely:Vale do Lob o, which lies 2 miles south of Almancil, and Quinta do Lago, about 6 miles southeast of the village. The town is a mere 20-minute drive from the Faro airport, which is a transportation hub for Almancil and its surrounding resorts.Almancil is important in providing goods and services to satisfy the needs of the two up-market developments. Also located here are many real estate offices and interior and furnishing shops. The town is also notable for the distinct pottery produced by locals.Areas of interest include the Church of Sao Lourenco east of Almancil, which showcases stunning azuleqo glazed tiles by the artist Policarpo de Oliveira Bernardes. These 18th century ceramic tiles exemplify the best of Algarvian architecture.Close by is the Sao Lourenà §o Cultural Centre, an establishment regularly holding events such as art exhibits and music shows. Also located in Almancil is the Està ¡dio Algarve (Algarve Stadium). Home ground of Louletano DC and SC Farense, the stadium is host t o the 2004 European Football Championship.Notable Almancil Beaches include, Praia do Ancà £o, Praia do Garrà £o, Praia da Quinta do Lago, Praia do Trafal, and Praia do Vale de Lobo.The Quinta do Lago complex near town is considered one of the most exclusive luxury developments in Southern Europe. It is popular with the English and is a retreat for many celebrities.The resort boasts a five-star hotel, first-class fine dining restaurants, and various luxury facilities. Rumor has it that Alan Shearer, George Michael, Luis Figo, Madonna, and Elton John own property in these areas.The tennis center is among the best in Europe and restaurants offering a myriad of cuisines catering to different palates are many. Also located in Almancil is the Almancil Karting, a leisure and competition complex. A replica of the former F1 Brazilian racetrack, it is a must-see for many for motor racing aficionados.AlvorAlvor is a relatively small coastal town located between Lagos and Portimao in the Alga rve. The town can be reached by taking a taxi from Portimao. Its main attraction as an international tourist center is the Alvor beach with its long, sandy beach that stretches till the Ria de Aivor estuary.

Good and Evil Essay

From the moment you were born, good and evil did not matter to you. As a child, your journey was not determined yet. People develop their own perceptions of what is right and wrong, as they grow up, through their experiences. What a person sees as evil and wrong could be different than how others view it. A person cannot rightfully understand what it means to be good unless they can avoid evil. To truly avoid being evil, one must learn to stay true to their ideals, goals, and relationships. The journey to good starts with the choices that will shape you for the rest of your life. An image of a new-born baby can be used as a symbol to represent good things such as: the untouched, purity, and innocence. Such description is titled under a new-born because when a baby is born, its sensory motors are heightened due to the incapability of sight. As from what I remembered, the inability of sight can also possibly symbolize another aspect of purity in a way where one is not able to see the impurities of another. A new-born child can also be represented as innocence. Once a baby is born, people keep babies indoors and out of harm and danger. A baby also can resemble an awareness of the purity and innocence being able to be easily broken, because of the fragility of an infant. Therefore, a new-born baby can generally symbolize purity, innocence, and untouched; however, it can also emphasize the fragility of the nature of good in such a way where if a single influence is displayed, one can easily learn and assimilate rapidly and change. With the society in which we live in today, the mass media plays a big role upon how an individual thinks, dresses, and acts. The media industry has become overpopulated by the dominance of men, thus demeaning women into several bad images. Women today are represented as sex symbols in music videos. If not, represented as a sex symbol, women are set on a high expectation to become model-like figures in order to gain acceptance of the society within the fashion industry; this expectation leads to the loss of one’s self through binging, dieting, and smoking cigarettes. Such dramatically terrible actions advertise bad images for the younger generation, encouraging them to become beautiful like one of the models on television. In regards to commercialism, there are many advertisements that encourage the society to allow children to become obese. We as a society are feeding our children with unhealthy foods due to the high rates of poverty. In relation to poverty, it is one of the reasons why there are criminals who steal to survive. Going back to Charles Darwin’s theory of â€Å"Survival of the Fittest†, we strive to survive in such a chaotic world filled with injustice and evil to where we reach a limit when it is difficult to be good sometimes. â€Å"It takes just as much energy to be evil as it does to be good and few people have energy enough for either course†¦ Evil isn’t what one does, it’s something one is that infects everything one does. † This quote, stated by Davies in Rebel Angels, exhibits the role of society. All of these industries believe that they are doing justice to the economy and the people (for example, to make people look or dress better, etc); however, in reality the products they are advertising are unhealthy for the public. We, as a general public, are solely attracted to what looks appealing, and are not really drawn to what it really does for you. This emphasizes the corruption of the society, thus revealing the nature of evil. â€Å"The evil that is in the world always comes of ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence, if they lack understanding. † This quote means that we are evil because we are ignorant of the good things in the world because we are selfish. And we are selfish because we refuse to understand such things. For example, when it comes to advertising, the industries advertise products for popularity and for more money without really caring about the outcomes of the public. They are ignorant of the outcomes the public. â€Å"The soul of the murderer is blind; and there can be no true goodness nor true love without the utmost clear sightedness. † Going back to the resemblance of one not being able to see, a blind man symbolizes purity because he is unable to see the imperfections of someone else. Camus explains that it is impossible for one to remain good, once an individual is evil; he or she has no representation of consciousness or guilt because he or she is only thinking about themselves. The nature of evil is thus, represented as the ignorance and selfishness of the people. It is said in Asian cultures that the good balances evil and vice versa and that one cannot do alone without the other. In Chinese philosophy, Yin-Yang describes â€Å"shadow and light. † It represents the polar opposites or the different forces that are interconnected and interdependent in the natural world, and how they work with each other in turn in relation to each other. Without the balance of good and evil, there would not be any balance within the earth’s core. Yin is like the moon, and Yang is like the sun. Without each other, one would not exist. For example, if the sun did not exist, there would not be such thing as â€Å"night† nor â€Å"day†. To paraphrase everything, the good becomes corrupted by the evil. However, the natures of good and the natures of evil intertwine to become a regular human being. There is an equilibrium between saints and Satans, somewhere in between the immortals, which is also known as us, human beings. There is Satan, because there is God. Human beings are made of good and evil. One cannot just be good, and one cannot just be evil. In some form, they are both good and evil, because one cannot be without the other. You need evil in the world, for there to be good. The way one sees evil may not be evil for the other but also, he might see good in it. Even though Davies says evil takes as much energy as good and people barely have energy to do either, but evil is not what someone does, but he is evil himself from how he infects everything from what he does.

Life and Works of Lee Bontecou, Sculptor of the Void

American artist Lee Bontecou (January 15, 1931–present) came of age at the outset of massive change in the United States. She was born in the throes of the Great Depression, came into consciousness during the Second World War, matured into an artist as the Korean War and other conflicts arose, and continued her practice throughout the Cold War, confronting issues like the Space Race and the threat of nuclear powers in her work. Fast Facts: Lee Bontecou Full Name: Lee BontecouOccupation: Artist and sculptor  Born:  January 15, 1931 in Providence, Rhode IslandEducation:  Bradford College and the Art Students League of New YorkKey Accomplishments: Represented the United States in the Sà £o Paulo Biennale in 1961, received a solo exhibition at the star-maker Leo Castelli Gallery in 1966, and was featured in numerous group shows. Early Life Growing up, Bontecou split her time between the New England city of Providence, RI and Canada’s Newfoundland, where she spent her summers. She was deeply enthralled by her physical, natural world. In Newfoundland, she was given the freedom to roam, explore the minerality of wet sand on Canada’s Eastern coastline, and escape to her room to draw images of the flora and fauna she encountered on her adventures. Bontecou’s father invented the first all-aluminum canoe, while her mother had worked in armaments factories during World War Two, making wires for use by the army. It is not hard to see both of her parents’ life circumstances as having an effect on the artist’s work, as the machinery, rivets, and junctures that both mother and father would have known in their professional lives made their way into the synthesized mounted sculptures for which Bontecou became known. (Some compare Bontecou’s work to engines, others to guns and cannons, but there is no doubt that there is something of the constructed, man-made world of industry in them.) Art Education While Bontecou certainly showed signs of an artistic inclination in her youth, her formal training did not begin until after college, when she enrolled in the Art Students League in New York. It was there that she discovered her love of sculpture, a medium that  resonated with her artistic sensibility. The work Bontecou produced while at the Art Students League earned her a Fulbright Grant to practice in Rome for two years, where  she lived from 1956-1957. It was in Rome that Bontecou discovered that  by adjusting the oxygen levels on the blowtorch she used in studio, she could create a steady stream of soot with which she could effectively draw as if with charcoal. Unlike charcoal, however, this soot produced an even deeper black color, one by which Bontecou was captivated—whether this fascination was due to memories of playing in the primordial sludge on the beaches during  her youthful summers in Canada or the fact that the color reminded  her of the unknown abyss of the universe is unknown, but both are equally plausible explanations.   With this new tool, Bontecou produced drawings she called â€Å"Worldscapes. These drawings are reminiscent of horizons, but feel as if they encompass the depths of space and the human soul simultaneously in their dark surfaces. Success and Recognition In the 1960s, Lee Bontecou saw much commercial success for her work. She was notable for both her  young age (she was in her 30s) and her gender, as she was one of the few female artists receiving such honors at the time.   Bontecou represented the United States in the Sà £o Paulo Biennale in 1961, was given a solo exhibition at the star-maker Leo Castelli Gallery in 1966, and was featured in group shows at the Museum of Modern Art, Corcoran Gallery in Washington, and the Jewish Museum. She was also the subject of numerous  articles  in popular magazines with national readership beyond the bounds of the art world.   Lee Bontecou, Untitled, 1963.   Museum of Modern Art By the  decade’s close, however, Bontecou had retreated from the art world. She began teaching at Brooklyn College in 1971 and would teach there until the 1990s, after which she moved to rural Pennsylvania,  where she still lives and works today. Notable Motifs and Style Bontecou is known for the presence of black holes in her work, often protruding physically into the observer’s space. Standing in front of them, the viewer is overwhelmed with the uncanny sensation of confronting the infinite, the abyss. She achieved this astonishing effect by lining her canvas structures with black velvet, the matte textured surface of which would absorb light, making it difficult to see the back of the work and producing the sensation that it could be, perhaps, without any back at all. The structural part of these works are pieced together scraps of various materials, from the canvas strips she scavenged  from the laundry above which she worked to the abandoned U.S. Mail bag she found. Bontecou would sometimes distance herself from the vertical picture plane and take to the air in her construction of hanging mobiles. Though they depart formally from her earlier works, these hanging sculptures share similar preoccupations with the wall sculptures, as they can be simultaneously seen as constructions of our minutest structures of existence—the forms of interacting molecules—or of cosmic significance, that is, the orbiting of planets and galaxies. Lee Bontecou, Untitled, 1980-1998.   Museum of Modern Art For Bontecou, the strange foreignness of her work was comprehensible when approached from her life circumstances, which is not to say her works are autobiographical, but rather, she worked from what she gathered within herself. As she said of her work: â€Å"This feeling [of freedom I derive from my work] embraces ancient, present, and future worlds; from caves to jet engines, landscapes to outer space, from visible nature to the inner eye, all encompassed in the cohesiveness of my inner world. Legacy Lee Bontecou’s work was born from the complex geopolitical tensions in the world, the advent of a mechanized total war, and the jostling for power that ensued during the Cold War.  While her work evokes munitions factories and the Space Race, subsequent generations—born safe from the threat of Hitler and after the Vietnam draft—can and will stand in front of Bontecou’s abstract works and think of the infinite mystery of which we are all a part. Sources Modern Women: Veronica Roberts on Lee Bontecou. YouTube.  . Published August 2, 2010.  Butler, C. and Schwartz, A. (2010).  Modern Women. New York: Museum of Modern Art, pp. 247-249.  Munro, E. (2000).  Originals: American Women Artists. New York: Da Capo Press.