Crossing Fields Symposium

Saturday 26 May 2018

12.30-4.30pm

FREE - book your place now

Crossing Fields: Join MA Art and Science graduating students and guests for a day of talks, demonstrations and discussions crossing fields in art and science. The symposium sessions complement Fields, the MA Art and Science degree show exhibited in K-Space, Central Saint Martins on view 23 – 27 May 2018.

Please book for the session/s you wish to attend and ensure you arrive on time so we can give appropriate time and attention to the whole programme.

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Part 1: Experience and Collaborations

12.30 to 14.15

The Subjective Experience in Art and Science

With Meri Lahti, Jill Mueller, Eleonora Sher and Caglar Tahiroglu

Sciences that deal with subjective human experiences such as psychology, anthropology and sociology are often associated with art in terms of their expressive or therapeutic aspects, but how do they sit within the Art and Science umbrella which is usually the domain of the ‘hard’ sciences of biology, physics, chemistry and maths?

Three dimensions of collaboration

Interdisciplinary collaborations can take many forms. This panel gives three perspectives on collaborations between artists and science organisations. Lisa Pettibone discusses how experiencing the CERN environment offers inspiration to artists. Helen Cawley, in an ongoing collaboration with the CLOUD Experiment at CERN, gives insight into how she has managed working with a large team of international scientists to communicate climate science, and Julie Light reflects on working with the Royal Society and how artists can generate new conversations about the future of scientific research.

Incredible Insects: Collaborating with Nature’s Biofactories.

Illustrator and Artist Liv Bargman and Scientist Rebecca Devine (University of East Anglia) will discuss their research and collaboration on Leafcutter Ants and the future of antibiotics: “Humans have been using antibiotics for less than 100 years and already antimicrobial resistance is posing a major risk to modern medicine. In contrast, leaf-cutter ants have been using antibiotics from the soil for around 50 million years to farm their symbiotic fungus.” (leafcutter ant project at UEA: https://www.uea.ac.uk/leafcutter-ants)

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Part 2: Embodiment and Connection

14.45 to 16.30

Off the Page and into the Fields

Interactive talks and discussion around the role art plays in transforming abstract ideas and theories about climate change and the environment into embodied experiences and actions with SRG Bennett, Priya Odedra and Rebecca Leach McDonald.

Poetry of the Imaginary Plane

Amy Knight explores the notion of the real-imagined plane in the mind’s eye, a timeless space, which has capacity to harvest unbounded creative potential.

How can we connect?

With María Teresa Chadwick Irarrázaval, Reggy (Tong) Lui, and Pandora Peng. A panel of discussions concerning the connection between people and society as a whole. This section of the symposium will explore the ways art and science might discuss the creation of a unifying visual language, the psychology of identity and the masks we present to each other, how data theory can investigate philosophies of connection to the deceased, and the balance between intimacy and tactile connection in a multimedia age.

Procession for the Physical Sciences

Bekk Wells will end the symposium with a grand processional finale.

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This symposium will be running alongside the exhibition which is open to the public from 12.00-17.00.