WHAT IS IT WHAT IT IS

Our next event is coming to you on Wednesday, June 4th when we'll be back upstairs at The Devereux Pub in London, hosting two speakers for your conversational pleasure.
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First up we'll have Claire McDermott. Claire is an artist who works across multiple media and has used her observations of the natural world to explore biophysics, the environment and sustainability. Her initial inspiration began with a flower in senescence (decay), watching it changing shape as the differently sized cells dried out, pulling the structure in different directions to create sculptural shapes. For us she’ll be exploring some extraordinary facts about the plant kingdom and how her interest in nature as an artist has built a bridge to the sciences - or should that be the other way around: has her interest in the natural world built a bridge to the arts?
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Following Claire, Shubhangi Butta will be talking with us about plasticity in the brain and the paradox created by it. Shubhangi has a Masters in Cognitive Neuropsychology and has always been fascinated by the relationship between neuroplasticity and social norms which took her into the chicken-and-egg world of ‘nature’ versus ‘nurture’ in the shaping of human behaviour. She’ll be looking at how and when our predispositions are formed, showing us the different factors that come into play throughout our lives as we continually “transform our brains”.

What makes Tickbird&Rhino two-speaker evenings such a good time is never quite knowing how two different worlds overlap until the conversation begins. So grab a seat and come along to join in. It’s bound to offer to some fantastic, thought-provoking fun.

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Based in London, Claire McDermott has an MA in Art & Science from Central Saint Martins and an MRes in Art & Humanities from the Royal College of Art. Her most recent exhibition was a solo exhibition at Headstone Manor and Museum (2024) and she has exhibited at Tate Exchange, UCLH, Cooke Latham Gallery, Beaconsfield Gallery, South Park Galleries and Safehouse 1&2. She has had residencies with Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, ual: SLoAS, AA2A, Sculpture Symposium 2016 and Cill Rialaig Arts Centre, Ireland, where her microscopic illustrations are held in their collection. Her public sculpture titled The Meeting Tree is installed in Newton Farm Ecology Park, London. She was featured in Phi Magazine, The Pluralist, and the Earthwise book while receiving in-kind support from the Port of London Authority, Central Saint Martins, UAL and grants from The Eaton Fund, Gane Trust, UAL Student Union and the Arts Council England.

Claire McDermott

According to Shubhangi Butta, reason and meaning come packaged as complimentary perks to our daily lives and yet they only come to our attention when we question their purpose. This reflection has led her to do the research she does, inspiring her journey into studying the cognitive processes that make us who we are. Having finished her Master's in Human Cognitive Neuropsychology at the University of Edinburgh, Shubhangi now works in product experience at Sensing Feeling, a company that develops real-time sensing solutions using deep neural networks (and the subject of one of Tickbird&Rhino's earliest talks way back in 2016).
Shubhangi Butta
Sensing Feeling

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image © Claire McDermott