Academic Sessions: London 2008
Incredible Inventions: On discoveries in Art and Science
Session Convenors:
Hans Maria de Wolf, Free University Brussels, hdewolf@vub.ac.be
Assistant: Charlotte Bonduel,cbonduel@vub.ac.be
Wouter J. Davidts, Department of Architecture & Urban Planning, Ghent University, wouter.davidts@ugent.be
Speakers:
Alkim almila Akdag Salah (University of California) Leonardo: The bridge between arts and sciences?
Fae Barbara Brauer (University of New South Wales/ University of East London) Inverting Scientific Invention: Duchamp’s travesty of chronophotography and ergonometry
Suzannah Biernoff (University of London) ‘New Men for Old’ – Art, surgery, and the rhetoric of bodily reconstruction in First World War Britain
Catherine Jane Jolivette (Missouri State University) The Enlargement of Vision: The Influence of science on the new landscapes
Nicola Setari (Scuola di Studi Avanzati di Venezia) Constructing Unusual Media. The cases of Thomas Edison and Wassily Kandinsky
Charlotte Bonduel (Free University of Brussels) Science Fiction: An amazing story on Virginia Woolf and Quantum Physics
Honoré ’O (The Platform Doctorate of Arts, The Brussels Model) The Longest Miracle
Peter Swinnen (Royal Conservatory of Brussels) Composing with Computers? Let’s remain serious
Session Abstract:
According to a commonly held but resistant belief, art and science are two monolithic spheres that seldom interfere. Although it contains some truth, reality has proven otherwise. While many important modern and contemporary artists obtained university degrees, others provided themselves with specific forms of intellectual training. Famous examples are Wassily Kandinsky’s education as a medical doctor, Joseph Beuys’ choice to become an artist instead of a scientist after World War II, and Tony Cragg’s professional turn from science towards the arts. But probably no other artist than Marcel Duchamp embodies the peculiar exchange and dialogue between art and science. Willing to overcome the barrier between the second and the third dimension (as part of his investigations for the Large Glass) Duchamp auto-didactically developed into a renowned expert in optics who shared his expertise with famous physicians worldwide. By the same argument, his famous ‘Rotoreliefs’ belong to the history of art, as they initiated a new chapter in the history of optics.
This session seeks to reassess the manifold truths and myths of the interdisciplinary trading between art and science, centred upon the notion of ‘invention’, of crucial historical and ideological importance within both art and science. We seek papers that specifically address either artistic ‘discoveries’ that advanced scientific knowledge, or scientific ‘innovations’ that influenced modern and contemporary artistic production. How were these findings presented within both their respective and neighbouring fields? What was the critical perception of the successive exchange? What were the so-called ‘benefits’, ‘risks’ and ‘challenges’ of the enterprise? And to what extent did and do such highly contested notions as originality, newness, inventiveness, exceptionality still govern and populate the discourse on the exchange between contemporary art and science?
This session wants to situate itself within the ongoing and lively debate on ‘Research in the Arts’, borne out of the recent evolution in the conception, goals and functions of higher art education. Initiated by The Platform ‘Doctorate in the Arts’, known as the Brussels Model, this session attempts to retrace moments in the history of modern and contemporary art and science when the strict separation between art and science was blurred and put up for discussion.
Hans Maria de Wolf, Free University Brussels, hdewolf@vub.ac.be
Assistant: Charlotte Bonduel,cbonduel@vub.ac.be
Wouter J. Davidts, Department of Architecture & Urban Planning, Ghent University, wouter.davidts@ugent.be
Speakers:
Alkim almila Akdag Salah (University of California) Leonardo: The bridge between arts and sciences?
Fae Barbara Brauer (University of New South Wales/ University of East London) Inverting Scientific Invention: Duchamp’s travesty of chronophotography and ergonometry
Suzannah Biernoff (University of London) ‘New Men for Old’ – Art, surgery, and the rhetoric of bodily reconstruction in First World War Britain
Catherine Jane Jolivette (Missouri State University) The Enlargement of Vision: The Influence of science on the new landscapes
Nicola Setari (Scuola di Studi Avanzati di Venezia) Constructing Unusual Media. The cases of Thomas Edison and Wassily Kandinsky
Charlotte Bonduel (Free University of Brussels) Science Fiction: An amazing story on Virginia Woolf and Quantum Physics
Honoré ’O (The Platform Doctorate of Arts, The Brussels Model) The Longest Miracle
Peter Swinnen (Royal Conservatory of Brussels) Composing with Computers? Let’s remain serious
Session Abstract:
According to a commonly held but resistant belief, art and science are two monolithic spheres that seldom interfere. Although it contains some truth, reality has proven otherwise. While many important modern and contemporary artists obtained university degrees, others provided themselves with specific forms of intellectual training. Famous examples are Wassily Kandinsky’s education as a medical doctor, Joseph Beuys’ choice to become an artist instead of a scientist after World War II, and Tony Cragg’s professional turn from science towards the arts. But probably no other artist than Marcel Duchamp embodies the peculiar exchange and dialogue between art and science. Willing to overcome the barrier between the second and the third dimension (as part of his investigations for the Large Glass) Duchamp auto-didactically developed into a renowned expert in optics who shared his expertise with famous physicians worldwide. By the same argument, his famous ‘Rotoreliefs’ belong to the history of art, as they initiated a new chapter in the history of optics.
This session seeks to reassess the manifold truths and myths of the interdisciplinary trading between art and science, centred upon the notion of ‘invention’, of crucial historical and ideological importance within both art and science. We seek papers that specifically address either artistic ‘discoveries’ that advanced scientific knowledge, or scientific ‘innovations’ that influenced modern and contemporary artistic production. How were these findings presented within both their respective and neighbouring fields? What was the critical perception of the successive exchange? What were the so-called ‘benefits’, ‘risks’ and ‘challenges’ of the enterprise? And to what extent did and do such highly contested notions as originality, newness, inventiveness, exceptionality still govern and populate the discourse on the exchange between contemporary art and science?
This session wants to situate itself within the ongoing and lively debate on ‘Research in the Arts’, borne out of the recent evolution in the conception, goals and functions of higher art education. Initiated by The Platform ‘Doctorate in the Arts’, known as the Brussels Model, this session attempts to retrace moments in the history of modern and contemporary art and science when the strict separation between art and science was blurred and put up for discussion.