Science and art

[blamski]

some interesting discussion - i'd love to see it remain civil. regarding the issue of what i was getting at with my orginal question; well that's not so easy to define.

 

i'm interested in how art and science can work together, how they can be informed by each other and how artists and scientists perceive each other's field. at the risk of making a generalisation here it seems like many people on here (who i'm guessing are mainly scientists) have the view that art is something that looks quite nice and can be quite abstract or offer a different interpretation of things. this is true art to the extent that much art is aimed at being pleasing to the eye, although most artists would agree that if this was its only aim and purpose then its only true home is the calender or chocolate box cover. this relates to the idea of seeing the art of science down the microscope 'becaue its beautiful'. i spend much time looking down microscopes and will lose myself in the world of nematodes and diatoms, blue-green algae and fungi - its stunning and makes you think somewhat about where we're all from and what it all means but it's sure as hell not art. not even if you blow the image up to wall size. artists get as annoyed with scientists stating they've done this kind of art and scientists do with artists proclaiming to have done science without really understanding what it entails.

 

i think its practically impossible for an artist to do good science and i think its practicaly impossible for a scientist to do good art. but i think that artists and scientists working together on projects can throw up all sorts of amazing stuff.

 

there has been a lot of talk about semantics and the meaning of words already. my only comment on that at this point would be that the meanings of the words 'art' and 'science' are manifold and wil certainly overlap at times in certain usage. however when we talk about the science in this and the art in the other i believe we are being mainly metaphorical.

 

anyway, this is by no means my complete view on the issue.. just a snippet for now and obviously just my opinion.

[Darnok]

You Can listen on here Science Show - 2 June 2007 - Flacco: the bridge between science and art

 

Transcript from 12:30 mins Enjoy

:)

 

"This transcript was typed from a recording of the program. The ABC cannot guarantee its complete accuracy because of the possibility of mishearing and occasional difficulty in identifying speakers."

 

Flacco: With science intruding in every sphere of human endeavour these days, it is no surprise that they are claiming that art can now be explained in neurological terms. Well, are we really expected to discern which neurons were firing as Jack Pollack threw a pot of cadmium red across a strip of 12-ounce cotton duck? Huh! I think not!

 

Do we really need to know what was on Marcel Duchamp's mind when he was painting Nude Descending a Staircase? And should we care what Pro Hart was thinking when he...when he...well, what was Pro Hart thinking?

 

I actually think that scientists are jealous of art. For what has science got to offer in return? E=mc2? Ha! My three-year-old could do that. Art speaks for itself, it does not require the opinions of experts. And yet you may have noticed that it is impossible to attend an exhibition these days without being offered an audio tour; a set of headphones featuring the voice of some designated expert explaining each work in tedious detail.

 

What next? I mean, you wouldn't go to a concert at the Opera House and sit there listening to an audio tour, would you? 'You are now listening to Stockhausen's Etude for Frightened Piano and Loquacious Dwarf in A Minor. Please note the polyphonic axelmelodic semitone which was inspired by a severe attack of tinnitus after the composer heard John Cage's Imaginary Landscapes for Iron Bar and Corrugated Tin. Enjoy.'

 

No, you don't need this information. I just wish these so-called experts would leave all of us artistes in peace and quiet as we happily view that haunting video instillation of a semi-nude art student reciting Sylvia Plath to her Irish Wolfhound while the animal defecates on a reproduction of Frida Kahlo's Weeping Coconuts. Now, surely this needs no explanation, for the work is obviously a post representational reaction to capitalist objectification, if you'll excuse my explanation.

 

And anyway, at the end of the day, it must be said that art is in the eye of the beholder. As my father always said, 'That Mona Lisa, she's no oil painting.'

[Turtle]

as an artist who works closely with science and scientists i'm interested to hear people's views on how the two relate to each other or how each can learn from the other. or if, indeed, they have anything to learn from each other.

...

i'd be interested to hear the views of others on this subject as this sketchy introduction only scratches the surface of a complex issue.

 

put me down for art & science are two sides of the same coin and i'm the edge. (on the edge if you prefer.:shrug: ) which side on the flip do you think the attached falls?

[blamski]

turtle. i like your coin metaphor, it works pretty well until the point where it falls. i refer the thing to keep spinning forever! it's the point at which we have to call something categorically science or categorically art that we encounter problems. i prefer to inhabit the grey and blurry zone between the two.

 

the example you attach is going to lure me into a little trap, i believe lol.

 

taking it just as an image i know nothing about my first reaction would be to say it was art (although not a piece of art i especialy like), though i would guess that it was expressing, or inspired by, some sort of mathematical theory. if it's purely representation of data then its not art (imo).

 

what is it??

[Turtle]

turtle. i like your coin metaphor, it works pretty well until the point where it falls. i refer the thing to keep spinning forever! it's the point at which we have to call something categorically science or categorically art that we encounter problems. i prefer to inhabit the grey and blurry zone between the two.

 

the example you attach is going to lure me into a little trap, i believe ;) lol.

 

taking it just as an image i know nothing about my first reaction would be to say it was art (although not a piece of art i especialy like), though i would guess that it was expressing, or inspired by, some sort of mathematical theory. if it's purely representation of data then its not art (imo).

 

what is it??

 

it is the spinning coin you prefer.:lol: at least it appears that way to me from my perch.:D however, it does suffer the very problem you address, i.e. people tend to see it as either art or science(math). here's the fullest explanation extant. >>http://hypography.com/forums/physics-mathematics/1343-katabatak-math-exploration-pure-number-theory.html

 

if you read very far you will find most the images missing; i exhausted myself trying to pull folks up onto the edge with me and removed them in a fit. :doh:

[blamski]

i may need a little time to get through that. i'll get back to you!!

[Turtle]

i may need a little time to get through that. i'll get back to you!!

 

:D acknowledged. all i have is time.:doh:

 

in the mean time, you brought up the issue of learning in all this:

as an artist who works closely with science and scientists i'm interested to hear people's views on how the two relate to each other or how each can learn from the other. or if, indeed, they have anything to learn from each other.

 

what jumps to mind is that given there is something to learn from each other, can that learning take place? if yes, how frequently and under what circumstances?

 

learning is more or less behavior modification; yes, no? i think people come hardwired for certain behavior limits, whether physical or mental. great & not so great athletes, high IQ and not so much. so while each of these groups learn from one another, they cannot do what each others do. stephen hawking can't dunk and michael jordon can't formulate postulates on black holes.

 

so, i see the join you want to exploit between art and science as more or less another similar group. i don't think these groups are your mother's groups however. my coin is not many peoples coin, and here's a why. >> in flipping a coin, what is the probability that it will come to rest on neither side, but on its edge? ;) :lol:

[blamski]

i'm learning that i have to be more careful with my selection of words on a science forum than on other forums i've inhabited :doh:

 

i'm not sure what word to use in place of learn though. the idea i want to get at concerns knowledge exchange and a degree of mutual understanding, not necessarily one learning to be the other. an idea i've toyed around with is the difference between being something and acting like or as something. for example, the majority of the time i'm an artist - or at least during the hours i consciously decide to act like one and when i'm not a tv watcher or a dish washer. from time to time i'm in the lab and i'm doing the things a scientist does, that is to say i'm acting like a scientist but i'm not sure i'm actually being one. i don't understand much of the theory behind what i'm doing in the way that a scientist would but i'm very aware of the cultural and aesthetic implications of what i'm doing, which an artist would and a scientist wouldn't.

 

i don't agree with your notion that people are hard wired for limits -while i'll grant you that stephen hawkins is never going to slam dunk you may be underestimating michael jordans capacity for thought (...maybe...). this is certainly not the case in science and art, i think it would be entirely possible for one to become the other *with the appropriate level of desire and application*. i'm not on the edge of a spinning coin because its the only place i CAN inhabit, its because its where i like to be.

 

now where's my little icon for beer??

[InfiniteNow]

now where's my little icon for beer??

 

:doh:

 

:lol:

 

 

;)

[blamski]

cheers :beer:

 

have one on me :)

 

its art!!

[freeztar]

its art!!

 

No it's not, it's science! :D :doh: :)

 

Cheers,

:beer:

[Turtle]

i'm learning that i have to be more careful with my selection of words on a science forum than on other forums i've inhabited ;)

without careful use of words/symbols, what else have we? chuck's humpty dumpty no less.

 

i'm not sure what word to use in place of learn though. the idea i want to get at concerns knowledge exchange and a degree of mutual understanding, not necessarily one learning to be the other.

it is not be the other, it is do what the other does.

 

an idea i've toyed around with is the difference between being something and acting like or as something. for example, the majority of the time i'm an artist - or at least during the hours i consciously decide to act like one and when i'm not a tv watcher or a dish washer. from time to time i'm in the lab and i'm doing the things a scientist does, that is to say i'm acting like a scientist but i'm not sure i'm actually being one. i don't understand much of the theory behind what i'm doing in the way that a scientist would but i'm very aware of the cultural and aesthetic implications of what i'm doing, which an artist would and a scientist wouldn't.

 

this is called being a generalist. these days, edge of coin territory.

 

i don't agree with your notion that people are hard wired for limits -while i'll grant you that stephen hawkins is never going to slam dunk you may be underestimating michael jordans capacity for thought (...maybe...). this is certainly not the case in science and art, i think it would be entirely possible for one to become the other *with the appropriate level of desire and application*. i'm not on the edge of a spinning coin because its the only place i CAN inhabit, its because its where i like to be.

 

putting aside cognition for a moment (we'll throw michael a bone), the human eye & associated brain tissue have hardwired limits for all humans regardless of training when compared to, say, cats. humans , by all scholarly accounts i've encountered, have hardwiring for language; all babies coo & babble the same. moreover, within these human hardwired abilities there is considerable variation in ability that is beyond restitution by application of knowledge. :eek:

 

now where's my little icon for beer??

 

:doh: :beer:

 

:D :)

[blamski]

well, here's a thread i started way back and has been festering in the bowels of hypography for some time. and if the members of this forum will indulge me i'd like to reignite it. there was some good discussion starting to happen back in '07

 

in the intervening years i've been working a lot on all sorts of art/sci projects and talking with, lecturing at and listening to a great variety of people loosely involved with the field/s.my ideas and opinions on the subject keep on evolving. my current mindset is that art and science should not be forced together, that the art/sci ideology that is proposed by so many academics in the field of contemporary media arts is very much flawed and misguided. in my opinion, art limits science and science limits art. the rigor of good science by its nature inhibits the ambiguity and metaphor that is present in all good art. that's my current standpoint, but its also highly problematic as it demands the definitions of science and art.

 

i'll have a go at doing that, and i'd love to see other members having a crack at doing the same...

 

science:

a discipline which, through a process of hypothesising and experimentation, aims to reduce unknowns and advance understanding of the reality we live in

 

art:

a discipline which through combining ideas and notions with critique and/or parody and/or ambiguity and/or metaphor and/or experimentation aims to propose new ways of understanding the reality we live in

 

these are, of course, subjective and may be very different to others. the key similarities for me are the notion of experimentation and the understanding of the reality we live in. experimentation in this sense is the very basic human drive to 'see what happens', an instinct which is basic and essential from the very first days of life. artists and scientists only seek to formalise a little more that instinct though in different ways.

 

the understanding of the reality in which we live is, according to many, the core human attribute and an inevitable goal on many levels, maybe even the thing that we are here to do.

 

this is a simple and broad thread re-opener. we can get deeper if that's what people are interested in. we can even pick out examples of art, science and sci/art and pick out where they lean toward one or other of the principles i've outlined here.

[Rade]

science:

a discipline which, through a process of hypothesising and experimentation, aims to reduce unknowns and advance understanding of the reality we live in

 

art:

a discipline which through combining ideas and notions with critique and/or parody and/or ambiguity and/or metaphor and/or experimentation aims to propose new ways of understanding the reality we live in

Very interesting thread topic. For discussion, here are definitions of science and art that would unite the two:

 

science: uncertain knowledge of reality

 

art: selective re-creation of science {edit: in place of the pointer word science plug in its definition}, thus we get:

art: selective re-creation of uncertain knowledge of reality

 

==

 

Science and art are similar in that both deal with reality in a very specific way, the relationship between percepts <----> concepts as relates to reality. Realism in art deals with perception of reality, how to make as close as possible a perfect image of reality. The scientist deals with how to make as close as possible a model or theory as a perfect image of reality. Both abstract art and science deal with concepts formed via perception, how to communicate abstract concept. Both science and art make use of mathematics to help form perfect images of reality. And, both science and art will always fail in their attempts to re-create reality with perfection, for all perception of reality leads to at best uncertain knowledge, or no knowledge.

 

While the scientist is interested in forming concepts from perception, once they are formed the scientist will communicate the new concepts via definition. Concepts become part of the unconscious mind, thus 'out-of-sight'.

 

Art, as relates to science, has as a goal to selectively re-create the metaphysical essence of what was initially perceived and hidden as concept within the unconscious mind such that ALL HUMANS can perceive the ESSENCE of concept. The re-creation process can involve use of sight, sound, olfactory, touch, words, etc. We can say the art brings 'into sight' (more correctly perception, not only visual) what science puts 'out-of-sight' into unconscious. In this way, the artist can greatly expand the ability of the scientist to communicate perception rather than by simple use of words to form definition or numbers to form equations. In contrast, the scientist can provide new concepts to the artist for them to re-create back into a perceptual representation of the reality connected to concepts, even concepts of concepts have a begin from reality.

 

As example. Consider the human body. The end result of science as a route to knowledge is perception of specific humans that is translated into an abstract concept of humans in general that is further translated into definition (rational animal). In contrast, the end result of art is to take the general concept of the human and selectively re-create the concept as perception. The end result of art is at one extreme the statue of David as the ideal abstract human as perception, or at the other extreme the Mr. Bill statue made of clay.

 

In summary. How they differ ? Scientists translate perception of reality -----> into concepts, artists re-create concepts -----> into an entity to be perceived as if reality. How they are the same ? Both scientists and artists deal directly with perception of reality as Realism, and both deal with concepts derived from reality as Abstraction. Engineers integrate both processes, first they translate perception of reality (facts and laws of nature) into concepts (a model of a bridge), then they re-create those abstract concepts into an entity of reality that can be used by humans (a bridge we drive cars on). Engineers are the dialectic of science and art, they mentally integrate information from both.

 

This is my attempt to answer your OP question concerning relationship between science and art as derived from rational definitions of both abstract concepts.

Edited March 25, 2013 by Rade

[blamski]

that's an interesting reply. i'm glad that you agree that the commonality between art and science is their drive to engage with the uncertainty of reality in some way, and that the role of perception is also very important in this engagement.

 

i'm not sure if i agree with your interpretation of how the conscious and unconscious mind states are used, though. what i particularly like from your post is this statement

 

"Scientists translate perception of reality -----> into concepts, artists re-create concepts -----> into an entity to be perceived as if reality"

 

i think that this is a nice way of summing up what i was getting at in the previous post. the two activities from a distance could seem the same, the act of transposing and translating information and experience from known to unknown forms and vice versa. in reality they are very different, and this is why i see it as being very difficult for any 'melding' of the two disciplines. while you use the term abstraction to refer to similarity i would say that the way the term 'abstraction' is used in science and art is dissimilar, much as an abstraction in coding is not the same as an abstraction in painting.

 

however, what is really key for me is the issue of clarity vs ambiguity. for me, art needs ambiguity... it needs that space that is open for interpretation by the viewer if it is not to be mere representation. (which is why scientific data readouts, graphs, or whatever, however beautiful they may be will never be art). science is precisely a process of isolating and removing those ambiguities.