Productive Crossings <\/strong><\/h4>\nOn Art and Science Collaborations and Never-ending Possibilities by Sonia Mehra Chawla<\/strong><\/h4>\nAs a visual artist and researcher working at the intersection of art and science, society and nature, economy and environment, I believe that interdisciplinary collaborations between the arts and sciences have the potential to create knowledge, ideas, and processes that are valuable and beneficial to both fields and society.<\/p>\n
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\u00a0“Science and art sometimes touch one another, like two pieces of the jigsaw puzzle which is our human life, and that contact may be made across the borderline between the two respective domains.” M.C.Escher<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n
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While art forms celebrate scientific accomplishments and create new forms of scientific data, they also offer a platform for critique. Interdisciplinary collaborations and conversations help to re-envision and re-contextualize the familiar, creating interesting juxtapositions, as well as developing metaphors that can influence and alter the way we think about our own bodies, and our world. In addition, the beauty we encounter in scientific research celebrates life, cultivates curiosity, and incites an appetite for discovery, while\u00a0probing essential questions about purpose and ethics and imagining both fantastic and terrifying futures.<\/p>\n
As individuals and communities, we have an impact on the Earth.\u00a0 Today, there is an increased awareness that some of the impact is detrimental to the Earth\u2019s systems \u2013 this includes our marine environment.\u00a0 The criticality of marine to life on land is increasingly being recognised.\u00a0 However, the impact of anthropogenically-forced climate change on our ocean will have consequences for both the habitats and species in the ocean and for life on land.\u00a0 It is critical that there is an increased awareness of the impact that humankind is having on the ocean and the effect that this will have on humankind.<\/p>\n
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![\"\"](\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\")
<\/a>Above: Details from ‘Universe-In -Details’, archival prints from the artists’ ‘Critical Membrane’ series on the endangered coastal and mangrove ecosystems of India.<\/p><\/div>\n
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The enquiry, the process, and the product\/creation, are three core areas in which both artists and scientists overlap in collaborative projects and processes.<\/p>\n
The idea of just asking a question through an altered lens is imperative. While working on projects, I sensed a large gap between the scientific and cultural worlds. I feel that more often than not, scientific data is inaccessible and absent from our daily culture, and the general public\u00a0.<\/p>\n
Art practice can be seen as a form of intellectual and imaginative inquiry, which has the ability to inspire discourses, to envision ideas, to make the intangible tangible, to introduce and insert the issues into our mainstream culture.\u00a0 Critical dialogues around art and science are often animated with these engagements and encounters:\u00a0 self\/other, nature\/society, individual\/society, nature\/culture, reason\/intuition, economy\/environment, biosocial\/biopolitical, technology\/future imaginaries, aesthetics\/functionality & purpose.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n
“The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science.”\u00a0 Albert Einstein<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n
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Both scientists and artists are proficient at looking for the unexpected and the unforeseen. Both celebrate what they describe. That is an exclusive and exceptional shared skill each brings to the\u00a0problem-solving experience. I think the significant question is, how can artists and scientists come together in collaborations that will benefit everybody, including the public? How can they offer an innovative space that can help rethink current notions of progress? How can art-science collaborations help us to notice, observe and appreciate our entanglements and enmeshment with our world? When both artists and scientists take a moment to step back from their disciplinary niches, they can comprehend and appreciate many approaches to understanding and unfolding our human experience.<\/p>\n
As a visual artist and researcher working at the intersection of art and science, society and nature, economy and environment, I believe that interdisciplinary collaborations between the arts and sciences have the potential to create knowledge, ideas, and processes that are valuable and beneficial to both fields and society.<\/p>\n
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\u00a0“Science and art sometimes touch one another, like two pieces of the jigsaw puzzle which is our human life, and that contact may be made across the borderline between the two respective domains.” M.C.Escher<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n While art forms celebrate scientific accomplishments and create new forms of scientific data, they also offer a platform for critique. Interdisciplinary collaborations and conversations help to re-envision and re-contextualize the familiar, creating interesting juxtapositions, as well as developing metaphors that can influence and alter the way we think about our own bodies, and our world. In addition, the beauty we encounter in scientific research celebrates life, cultivates curiosity, and incites an appetite for discovery, while\u00a0probing essential questions about purpose and ethics and imagining both fantastic and terrifying futures.<\/p>\n As individuals and communities, we have an impact on the Earth.\u00a0 Today, there is an increased awareness that some of the impact is detrimental to the Earth\u2019s systems \u2013 this includes our marine environment.\u00a0 The criticality of marine to life on land is increasingly being recognised.\u00a0 However, the impact of anthropogenically-forced climate change on our ocean will have consequences for both the habitats and species in the ocean and for life on land.\u00a0 It is critical that there is an increased awareness of the impact that humankind is having on the ocean and the effect that this will have on humankind.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Above: Details from ‘Universe-In -Details’, archival prints from the artists’ ‘Critical Membrane’ series on the endangered coastal and mangrove ecosystems of India.<\/p><\/div>\n <\/p>\n The enquiry, the process, and the product\/creation, are three core areas in which both artists and scientists overlap in collaborative projects and processes.<\/p>\n The idea of just asking a question through an altered lens is imperative. While working on projects, I sensed a large gap between the scientific and cultural worlds. I feel that more often than not, scientific data is inaccessible and absent from our daily culture, and the general public\u00a0.<\/p>\n Art practice can be seen as a form of intellectual and imaginative inquiry, which has the ability to inspire discourses, to envision ideas, to make the intangible tangible, to introduce and insert the issues into our mainstream culture.\u00a0 Critical dialogues around art and science are often animated with these engagements and encounters:\u00a0 self\/other, nature\/society, individual\/society, nature\/culture, reason\/intuition, economy\/environment, biosocial\/biopolitical, technology\/future imaginaries, aesthetics\/functionality & purpose.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n “The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science.”\u00a0 Albert Einstein<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Both scientists and artists are proficient at looking for the unexpected and the unforeseen. Both celebrate what they describe. That is an exclusive and exceptional shared skill each brings to the\u00a0problem-solving experience. I think the significant question is, how can artists and scientists come together in collaborations that will benefit everybody, including the public? How can they offer an innovative space that can help rethink current notions of progress? How can art-science collaborations help us to notice, observe and appreciate our entanglements and enmeshment with our world? When both artists and scientists take a moment to step back from their disciplinary niches, they can comprehend and appreciate many approaches to understanding and unfolding our human experience.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/blogs.gov.scot\/marine-scotland\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/23\/2019\/07\/Sonia-Mehra-Chawlas-Details-from-Universe-In-Details-archival-prints-from-Critical-Membrane.jpg\")
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