Folklore has it that Einstein came to his Theory of Relativity one night while he was dreaming that he was riding on a moonbeam, when he came to his insight. He subsequently did the math, the concluson of which was later supported experimentally when star light was shown to bend near the mass of a heavenly body..
A question is , if he had got out of bed and painted a self portrait of him riding the moonbeam with visualised notions of relativity dilgently and rigorously painted in oils would he have been a scientist or an artist?
One could say that in Art the artist is THE research method used. On a single spectrum of artist to scientist, perhaps to throw a figure in, the artist is 95% of all research methods used in a work of artistic inquiry, with a few minor synthetic ones assocaited with particular media used. The scientist is perhaps circa 5% artist and 95% inquiry-cyborg.
In inquiry related to the artificial world - designing, in contrast to discovery of the natural world or the artists view, this is sensitve as to the position the researcher on this spectrum.
A few ramblings on a Friday afternoon to amuse perhaps.
Alec Robertson
________________________________
From: yasmin_discussions-bounces@estia.media.uoa.gr on behalf of ana leonor rodrigues
Sent: Thu 14/05/2009 13:21
To: abureaud@gmail.com; YASMIN DISCUSSIONS
Subject: Re: [Yasmin_discussions] One Two Three More Cultures
Hello all,
I tend to agree with Annick that it is more of a cultural problem.
Since 92, I've been developing a project that is an accidental collapse
inside blue kitchens, were bacteria acquire a size and performance unknown
until now. Lately they became symbiotic with the humans inhabiting those
kitchens.
It is a long story and I'm not entering the details now.
It is an artistic work where I use the scientific methodology and statements
and then manipulate them in a way where I can build a reality of my own.
Let's say that I use the scientific reality and abuse it in an inventive and
poetical way.
For long I wanted to work with scientists so that we could create an even
more plausible and misleading kind of reality but I have always stumped with
this kind of cultural difficulty of mixing both realities.
Only this year was I able to find people at the Faculty of Science and
Technology - Campus de Caparica (Lisbon) that where in the mood to enter my
project, and with an exhibition of my work there, we did a conference with a
microbiologist where we both discussed my "theories".
To my own surprise much of what I have invented like for example microscopic
bacteria do exist.
It was very exciting both to me and to scientists that saw an open field of
serendipity that amused them and interested them.
My work is totally artistic.
I think one of the issues art does not aim at is to discover or establish
truths.
However the total separation of the two worlds is, to my view, extreme,
because invention and imagination is needed in both circumstances.
In the end what is fascinating is that one approaches the understanding of
life and of reality trough different points of view that often merge.
One could probably say that they are different ways of investigating ...
Ana Leonor
2009/5/12 Annick Bureaud <abureaud@gmail.com>
> Roger
>
> And on a second thought : how many "first rate scientists" did a "good
> work" in arts and humanities ? Is there that many ? The problem is that I
> have never seen a list of names !
>
> And on a third thought : is this really the issue ?
>
> Annick
>
> Annick Bureaud wrote:
>
>> Roger
>>
>>
>>
>>> Lightman re iterates a " wisdom" that i remember my father telling me
>>> as a kid= Alan Lightman makes the generalisation that there are
>>> a number of good examples of first rate scientists who went on to
>>> do good work in the arts and humanities, but there are almost
>>> no examples of people who started their careers as artists and then
>>> went on to make important discoveries in the sciences or engineering
>>> or mathematics
>>>
>>>
>> May be because it is nicer to be an artist than a scientist ;-)
>>
>> Joke apart, I think you are wrong, that it is one of those cliches that
>> are persistent. If you don't split science between "applied" and "pure"
>> (your favorite topic at the moment), then you can find many artists that had
>> a double carreer or invented things or even some that went into applied
>> science. The problem is that nobody as ever been interested to do a PhD on
>> this or even a book and the second problem is that those people have usually
>> been forgotten as artists (we don't remember they started as artists).
>> And I guess that those who had both carreer, do not necessarily want to
>> mix the 2, specially if they are doing "applied science" as it is not very
>> well looked at by the art milieu. Yes, indeed, this is a cultural problem !
>>
>> Annick
>>
>
> --
>
> ------------------------
> Annick Bureaud (abureaud@gmail.com)
> tel/fax : 33/(0)1 43 20 92 23
> mobile/cell : 33/(0)6 86 77 65 76
> Leonardo/Olats : http://www.olats.org <http://www.olats.org/>
> -------------------------
>
>
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--
Ana Leonor M. Madeira Rodrigues
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