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Our Imperceptible Universe

Research output: Exhibits, objects and web-based outputsExhibition

Published
Publication date8/11/2016
Place of PublicationPeter Scott Gallery
Medium of outputDrawing
Size56 drawings
<mark>Original language</mark>English

Abstract

Dark Matters: Our Imperceptible Universe is the main output of the AHRC Science in Culture innovation award ‘ Dark Matters: Thresholds of imperceptibility across art, cosmology and social science’. It is an exhibition of 56 drawings, a film, texts and is documented in an exhibition catalogue, website and additional film. Thiswas the only visual art research successfully funded by an AHRC Science in Culture Innovation award in this funding cycle (2014) .The exhibition was supported by further funding from the Institute of Physics and the Being Human Festival 2016, sponsored by the AHRC, British Academy and School of Advanced study, University of London, and an impact and knowledge exchange grant fromLancaster University. The research questions how drawing, as an empirical tool, might empirically negotiate and communicate phenomena beyond human sensing. The project developed forms of drawing as a lens, through which to articulate thinking and practice of the (im)material as experienced in cosmology and articulated in feminist materialist scholarship (Kirkby, Bennet ,Barad). The research brought together an artist (Casey), a cosmologist ( Kostas Dimopoulos) and anthropologist (Rebecca Ellis) totest a 3-way methodology between art, anthropology as a means to sidestep problems intypical art-science model. Exhibited at the Blyth Gallery, and Centre for Language Culture and Communication at Imperial College London following its launchin December 2015 at the Peter Scott Gallery Lancaster. The initial exhibitionlaunchedthe international conference ‘Dark Matters: thresholds of Imperceptibility’. The London exhibition ( Nov 2016 –Jan 2017) was sponsored by the Being Human where the public talks by Sarah Casey and Roberto Trotta (Imperial College) and film screening sold out and exhibition was viewed by over 900 people, including 354 online. This work led to a further symposium ‘ the Materiality of Nothing’ convened by Casey ( July 2017) with international speakers from the USA, Europe and Australia. The research projectwas presented as a case study at the AHRC Science in Culture workshop (Birmingham University Oct 2016).The film documenting the project was shortlisted for the AHRC research film of the year in 2017.An additional film about the exhibition work, Drawn to the Surface,was published in a special edition of Theory Culture and Society.Work from the exhibition has since been selected for peer-reviewed exhibitions in the UK, Taiwan and the US and presented at internationalmultidisciplinary conferences: e.g. Association of American Geographers (Chicago), Royal Geographic Society (Exeter),Beyond Perception (Aberdeen). Other public engagements events ‘ Dark Matters’ Whitby MuseumAugust 2017( sponsored by Institute of Physics); Dark Matters Day,public talks and exhibitionStorey Lancaster(31October 2018).