Toolbox Dialogue Initiative

"The Toolbox Dialogue Initiative provides a philosophical yet practical enhancement to cross-disciplinary, collaborative science. This enhancement comes primarily in the form of a dialogue-based “Toolbox workshop”, and it is intended for interdisciplinary and interprofessional teams of collaborators. Rooted in philosophical analysis, Toolbox workshops enable cross-disciplinary collaborators to engage in a structured dialogue about their research assumptions. This yields both self-awareness and mutual understanding, supplying cross-disciplinary research (CDR) collaborators with the robust foundation needed for effective collaborative research and practice."

Leonardo RFPs

Leonardo was founded in 1968 in Paris by kinetic artist and astronautical pioneer Frank Malina who saw the need for a journal to serve as an international channel of communication among artists, with emphasis on the writings of artists who use science and developing technologies in their work. Published by The MIT Press and led by executive editor Roger Malina, Leonardo has become the leading international peer-reviewed journal on the use of contemporary science and technology in the arts and music and, increasingly, the application and influence of the arts and humanities on science and technology.

Leonardo is interested in work that crosses the artificial boundaries separating contemporary arts and sciences. Featuring illustrated articles written by artists about their own work as well as articles by historians, theoreticians, philosophers and other researchers, the journal is particularly concerned with issues related to the interaction of the arts, sciences and technology.

Leonardo focuses on the visual arts and also addresses music, video, performance, language, environmental and conceptual arts—especially as they relate to the visual arts or make use of the tools, materials and ideas of contemporary science and technology. New concepts, materials and techniques and other subjects of general artistic interest are covered, as are legal, economic and political aspects of art.

The following are the current calls for Special Section papers for Leonardo journal. Please see each for information on solicited topics, paper types, and submission processes.

• Art and Atoms, guest editor Tami Spector
• Art and Cancer, guest editor Dhruba Deb
• Artists and War, guest editor Michele Emmer
• ArtScience: The Essential Connection, guest editor Robert Root-Bernstein
• Environment 2.0, guest editor Drew Hemment
• PhD in Art and Design, guest editors Ken Friedman and Jack Ox
• Pioneers and Pathbreakers, to coincide with Leonardo's 50th anniversary
• Pioneers and Pathbreakers/Narratives in Dark Culture memoir series
• Smart Textiles: Science and Technology of Textile Art, supported by the Marjorie Duckworth Malina Fund
• Leonardo Abstracts Service (LABS), editor-in-chief Sheila Pinkel

Now announcing The Leonardo STEAM Initiative on Education with guest editors Robert Root-Bernstein and Tracie Costantino.

UPDATE 25 May 2018: Please see the call for papers for a new special section Science and Art: The Essential Connection with guest editors Catherine Baker and Iain Gilchrist.

Danielle Siembieda
Managing Director

Call for Open Peer Review: An Anthropocene Primer

Version 1.0 of An Anthropocene Primer is hosted by the IUPUI Arts and Humanities Institute as an open access book. In collaboration with Indiana University Press, we are inviting the public to participate in an open peer review of the volume between October 23, 2017 and February 1, 2018. We will revise the primer in response to the comments and intend to publish the text as an open access book as well as a hard copy volume in 2018.

An Anthropocene Primer is a great example of a project weaving humanities and science together seamlessly to explore a serious current socio-ecological issue. The online Hypothes.is software allows anyone to annotate and contribute to the project.

The primer website and blog also includes references to other interesting and successful art/sci collaborations, papers, and open peer review projects like the Rivers of the Anthropocene, and Environmental Humanities and Climate Change.

Here's how to get involved:

Art program archive guidelines

The Nevada Museum of Art - Center for Art + Environment is a cutting edge operation that is the only permanent art and environment center in the world. NMA-CA+E works closely with UC Berkeley's Sagehen Creek Field Station to develop their artist-in-residency program.

As part of that relationship, the Center permanently archives the process of art production at the field station. In 2017, they produced guidelines for artists and archivists who wish to do the same. You are free to download and use these guidelines for your own program. Please credit the Nevada Museum of Art - Center for Art + Environment in any publications.

Alliance of Artist Communities - 2018 Emerging Program Institute, October 13-15, 2018

Field stations and marine labs with a current or proposed artist residency should seriously consider attending this AAC training, which

"...combines best practices from the arts-and-cultural sector with specific, hands-on information about artist residencies."

Held October 13-15, 2018 in Philadelphia, PA, "this training combines best practices from the arts-and-cultural sector with specific, hands-on information about artists' residencies.

Whether you are still in the early dreaming stage of creating an artist colony or working with an established institution that is developing a new residency program, the Emerging Program Institute will offer models for success, a community of peers, and access to residency leaders, funders, and connectors. #aac18epi

Topics include:

• community engagement and the relevance of place 
• building a support base and funding your program 
• equity and access in artist outreach, engagement and selection 
• business planning for artist residencies 
• "ask an expert" panels of residency leaders, artists and government funders 
• case studies, site visits - and more!

PLEASE NOTE: We cap attendance at 50 people to keep the program participatory and accessible. This Institute sells out every year, so we encourage you to register early to secure your spot! Registration opens in June."

Additionally, the training is held just before the 2018 Alliance of Artist Communities annual conference in Philadelphia, so you can plan to attend that event as well, to make connections that will benefit your program.

Such an inspiring panel this morning at the Alliance of Arts Communities conference in Denver this morning. #aac17conf #digitalsketchnotes #digital #sketchnotes #politics #values

A post shared by Heather Leavitt Martinez (@corpgraffitiart) on Oct 4, 2017 at 9:52am PDT

I replaced my Apple Pencil and am back in business! Sketchnoting Evolution of a Board from "The Art of Governance" with Carolyn Love #aac17conf . . #sketchnotes #digital #sketchnoting #applepencil #nonprofit #arts #boarddevelopment #ipadpro #lettering #adobedraw #evolution

A post shared by Heather Leavitt Martinez (@corpgraffitiart) on Oct 3, 2017 at 2:03pm PDT

Learning so much about funding for artists at the Alliance of Arts Communities conference in Denver this morning. #aac17conf #digitalsketchnotes #digital #sketchnotes #politics #values #adobedraw #applepencil #ipadpro #yellow #red #blue #white #digitalink

A post shared by Heather Leavitt Martinez (@corpgraffitiart) on Oct 4, 2017 at 10:37am PDT

While I didn’t finish the first skectchnote (there was so much to learn and it went so fast), here you can see how two of my digital sketchnotes came to be last week at the Alliance of Artist Communities conference in Denver. #aac17conf #digitalsketchnotes #sketchnotes #ipadpro #adobedraw #applepencil #instavideo #videogram #digitaldrawing #timelapse

A post shared by Heather Leavitt Martinez (@corpgraffitiart) on Oct 11, 2017 at 8:28pm PDT

Leonardo Abstract Services (LABS) for art/sci theses

Dear Faculty:

This is a reminder that you recommend to your students who have successfully finalized an MA, MFA or PhD thesis that in some way explores the intersection of art, science and/or technology to submit an abstract of their thesis to Leonardo Abstract Services (LABS). This database, which has over 500 thesis abstracts, can be found at collections.pomona.edu/labs/.

LABS offers an international platform for graduate work so that artists and scholars can participate in a dialogue with peers from around the world. Your support of their work and this project helps to invigorate the next generation and faculty who guide them. Thanks for your help with this.

All the best,

Sheila Pinkel
LABS English Language Coordinator

a2ru Programs, and Groundworks Conference Announcement, November 8-11, 2015

The Alliance for the Arts in Research Universities (a2ru) generates knowledge, advocacy, and resources that enable universities to integrate arts and design practices, fostering highly adaptive creators and thinkers.

"There is a problem with creativity. Companies and governments are very keen to promote it, but they’re not sure what it is or who has it."
"Art should be regarded as a specific kind of cognitive engineering".

The above quotes come from a2ru's extensive Knowledge Base that provides information that enables research universities to adapt effective strategies for integrating arts practice, and to support and inform further original inquiry. They also offer project grants, and request assistance in compiling relevant studies and examples of original research collaborations.

* * *

The 2015 a2ru National Conference takes place November 8-11, 2015 at Virginia Tech. From their webiste:

"GroundWorks: Improving and Supporting Practice in the Third Space" will convene partners and allies to address the next generation of opportunities and challenges facing arts transdisciplinary practice, peer review, infrastructures, and partnerships in research universities.

Registration is open to all.

GOALS & OUTCOMES

• Disseminate and leverage the Mellon Best Practices Guide to improve practice and infrastructure. Develop and test set of shared values and criteria for peer reviewing, critiquing, and understanding research and creative practice in the third space.
• Make progress towards a peer-reviewed aggregator/forum for arts transdisciplinary research and practice.
• Lay groundwork for shared practices guidelines for third space research and practice in S.E.A.D, Arts + Health, and Arts + Social Entrepreneurship endeavors.
• Explore emerging cultural policy platforms through high-impact regional partnerships.

Resources for art/science collaborations

Here's a helpful note from Tracey Bell, ecoorchestra.com via Fred Swanson:

======================

I wanted to share a few resources with you for your future explorations into this topic:

I'm not sure if you have connected with the folks that run the Cultural Programs of the National Academies of Science, but you should reach out to them for sure!

One example of national standards for art+science collaborations might be the evaluative criteria for the NEA's Artworks grant for cross-disciplinary art+science projects.

You could also check out the Americans For the Arts for everything from the economic impact of the arts to models for civic engagement in the arts. Subpages of potential interest to you:

• National Arts Administration and Policy Research Database
• Animating Democracy "As a program of Americans for the Arts, we bring national visibility to arts for change work, build knowledge about quality practice, and create useful resources. By demonstrating the public value of creative work that contributes to social change and fostering synergy across arts and other fields and sectors, we work to make the arts an integral and effective part of solutions to the challenges of communities and toward ensuring a healthy democracy."

With regard to other topics:

The Art and Social Justice movement looks at returning agency to traditionally oppressed or underrepresented groups and giving them the ability to tell their own story through performing arts, writing, or visual arts. Often projects have a connection to land, place, food, the environment. The Art and Social Practice movement , which is similar but not exactly the same, looks at socially engaged art making and often has an connection to the environment and place as an integral part of community life.  A great place to start looking for more information on these topics would be the Open Engagement Conference.  PSU also has an MFA program in Social Practice Art.

And last but not least, here are some examples of social practice/science/art work that I found in my research that might be of interest to you as well:

• City as a Living Laboratory  Includes best practices framework for collaboration between artists and scientists. "Mary Miss / City as Living Laboratory (MM/CaLL) is an initiative spearheaded by artist Mary Miss to establish a platform for artists, working in collaboration with scientists, urban planners, policy makers, and the public, to make sustainability tangible through the arts. CaLL asks: by what means can we foster roles for artists and designers to shape and bring attention to the pressing environmental issues of our times?"
• Highwater Line Performance piece that engages communities in dialogue about rising water levels and climate change and includes a action guide and educational materials. (Sponsored by Eco ArtSpace) 

Science, Technology, and Art in International Relations (STAIR)

"The International Studies Association (ISA) has been the premier organization for connecting scholars and practitioners in fields of international studies since 1959. 

 ISA was founded in 1959 to promote research and education in international affairs. With well over six thousand members in North America and around the world, ISA is the most respected and widely known scholarly association in this field. ISA cooperates with 57 international studies organizations in over 30 countries, is a member of the International Social Science Council, and enjoys nongovernmental consultative status with the United Nations."

One program section of ISA is Science, Technology, and Art in International Relations (STAIR).

"This newly chartered section recognizes that science, technology, and art are at the core of global politics. They shape much of the everyday reality of international security, statecraft, development, design of critical global infrastructures, approaches to social justice, and the practices of global governance. Science, technology and art (i.e., in the form of creativity, the arts, architecture and design) permeate international affairs in the form of material elements and networks, technical instruments, systems of knowledge and scientific practices. Yet, they also challenge existing conceptual approaches and prompt us to step beyond IR canons to seek inter-disciplinary collaborations. Through this new section we generate the space for international Relations (IR) as a discipline and field to engage these matters through productive intellectual research conversations with existing subsections as well as other disciplines. Our intention is that this will facilitate theoretical understandings of how we go about creating, assessing, and deliberating scientific, technological and artistic design and their impact on the shifts of contemporary world order. To use a methodological metaphor, if science, technology and art are held constant in most IR models, STAIR aims to make them variable!"

NEH Common Good program

The National Endowment for the Humanities is up to some interesting things.

Here's a note from Eva Caldera, Assistant Chairman for Partnership and Strategic Initiatives (emphasis added):

Our new NEH initiative, The Common Good: Humanities in the Public Square, includes an invitation to the humanities community to examine opportunities for the humanities to contribute to the changing understanding of the relationships between humans and the natural environment. If you or any of your colleagues would like to learn more about the initiative or its grant programs or the work of the Endowment more generally, please feel free to be in touch.

Great meeting tool

This probably looks like spam, but I thought it would be a useful thing to pass along.

We just tried this service--Free Conference Calling. It turned out to be a great tool for staying connected. It is very easy to use and reliable. You can record and archive your meetings, too, for folks who can't be there.

Clore Leadership Programme

The Clore Leadership Programme is a UK-based organization that offers a range of programs for outstanding individuals who wish to develop as cultural leaders.

By investing in individuals, we aim to strengthen leadership across a wide range of creative and cultural activities.

The annual Clore Fellowship award provides support to Brits and a few internationals who "...may be working freelance or within cultural organisations, of all types and sizes, in areas ranging from archives to theatre production, and including visual and performing arts, film and digital media, heritage, creative industries, museums, libraries and cultural policy."

While Americans probably don't qualify for the awards, there may be opportunities to do interesting projects with Clore Fellows.

"The programme blends real-life examples with practical skills and tools.

You will be expected to challenge and stretch yourself. Peer learning is a key element of the programme. It is not a taught course and there are no exams or qualifications. Instead you will learn from experience, your own and others, by sharing and reflecting and by putting your new-found skills into practice through workshops, a secondment and collaborative enquiry.

You will be encouraged to be curious, to question, to discuss and to write about cultural leadership."

Fusing Arts, Culture and Social Change: High Impact Strategies for Philanthropy

Clearly, science influences culture. Field science has had an incredibly powerful and controversial influence in the age of climate change.

Here's an interesting paper on the changing arts funding landscape by Holly Sidford.

It is a call to reach out in unconventional directions, pointing out that, "Current arts grantmaking disregards large segments of cultural practice, and by doing so, it disregards large segments of our society."

This sounds like the same impetus that is driving field science to engage with art from the other direction.

The paper also includes an excellent defense of art:

"Culture and the arts are essential means by which all people explain their experience, shape their identity and imagine the future. In their constancy and their variety, culture and the arts allow us to explore our individual humanity, and to see our society whole. People need the arts to make sense of their lives, to know who they are. But our democracy needs the arts, too. The arts animate civil society. They stretch our imagination. They increase our compassion for others by providing creative ways for us to understand and deal with differences. The arts protect and enrich the liberty, the human dignity and the public discourse that are at the heart of a healthy democracy."

=================

Update: 

"Across sectors, artists and arts organizations are increasingly being called upon to activate the social imagination to bring forth new ways to know and understand an increasingly complex world. Artists are providing a critical lens that educates, provokes, and holds a mirror to society, influencing what gets attention in the public sphere and shaping perspective and opinion. Arts and culture are engaging communities in creative process and social action, broadening who has voice and offering a connecting point to those who have not felt power in the civic realm before."

Trend or Tipping Point: Arts and Social Change Grantmaking is a paper from the Animating Democracy program of Americans for the Arts, by Pam Korza and Barbara Schaffer Bacon.

"Focusing on grantmaking in the United States, the report aims to characterize the nature of support from both private and public sectors. It examines how various grantmakers think about social change in the context of agency goals and what outcomes they are looking for through their support. The report looks at the types of activities and projects that are being funded as well as grantmaking strategies and structures. It documents obstacles and opportunities for greater support, considering both funders who are and are not supporting this work."

Art that sparks science questions

Some of us are looking for examples of art that precedes and sparks science.

Demonstrations of the opposite are easier to find, given that they result in an obvious artwork, and artists tend to discuss their motivations and influences more than scientists do.

As examples, see the previous post about the movie Interstellar, the discovery of accurate turbulence in Van Gogh's "Starry Night", Ed Belbruno's use of painting to discover natural phenomenon he then describes mathematically, and this fascinating documentary segment from CERN about photography:


The Invisible Photograph: Part 5 (Subatomic) from Carnegie Museum of Art on Vimeo.

I'd also propose this interesting bit that went around a few years back. it discussed how the CGI animators for the Lord of the Rings movies battle sequences were having trouble because they programmed their characters with AI (essentially, free-will) in order to avoid the artificial look of pre-programmed animation behavior.

Unfortunately for the animators, the characters wisely chose to run away rather than fight! As it turns out, this was apparently a bug in the software, but it triggered some intense discussion about the science of behavior, artificial intelligence, emergent properties, and the fight or flight response.

=============

Updates...

• From Nancy Lowe, via SymbASA:

...I was showing them a book form, a pleated structure that sort of rotated around on itself, and this guy stood up and said, ‘That’s it!’ He had been working on something called an autophagosome, which has a double cell membrane and rotates around on itself during cellular division.” (...it’s like a temporary garbage truck that delivers cell waste to a lysosome, so that waste can be broken down) “He’d been trying for years to to visually depict how it moves. He could see it in his head, but couldn’t get it as a flat image to show his students. My book form moved the way forward.”

• From R. Root-Bernstein, M. Root-Bernstein, 2013. The Art and Craft of Science. Educational Leadership, Feb 2013: 16-21...

"Scientific thinking is almost synonymous with recognizing and forming patterns. Every hypothesis and theory is the discovery of a pattern within some set of observations. For this reason, artists, choreographers, and musicians, whose works invariably invent and play with patterns, have a great deal to teach scientists (Root-Bernstein & Root-Bernstein, 1999).

The father of the famous physicist Richard Feynman clearly understood this connection. He introduced his son to patterning games very much like those taught at such art schools as the Bauhaus when the boy was still a toddler. One of those games involved colored tiles like those used to make mosaics. Feynman senior would start a pattern and see whether Richard could finish it. Soon the boy was making up his own patterns and yet another pattern was set in motion (Feynman, 1988). As an adult, Richard Feynman discovered many new patterns in physics, which later won him a Nobel Prize.

Ned Seeman, one of the founders of the new science of nanotechnology (the making of functional objects out of molecule-sized materials), was similarly inspired by M. C. Escher’s patterns. Stumped by a problem concerning ways to make cubic structures out of DNA, Seeman realized that an Escher print that pictured a school of fish-like creatures swimming in three dimensions provided the solution (Nadrian Seeman, n.d.). Seeman now studies artists’ patterns explicitly for their insights into the processes of making structures (Seeman,in press).

Other scientists have also looked to the work of artists—or used their expressive forms—to hunt for clues to hidden patterns. Physicists, for instance, have worked with choreographers to illuminate the movement patterns of electrons; microbiologists have squaredanced their way through the processes of gene regulation. Some educators have likewise used creative movement in the science classroom. Witness Zafra Lerman’s work teaching chemistry through dance and theater."

• THIS!

Other organizations working at the Art & Science intersection

From their website:

"From its beginnings, Leonardo/ISAST has served as THE virtual community for purposes of networking, resource-sharing, best practices, research and events in Art/Science/Technology...

...By enhancing communication between scientists, artists, and engineers, Leonardo supports experimental projects and interacts with established institutions of art and science to transform their research and educational practices."

Leonardo is the Journal of the ISAST, which focuses on artists working with science and technology-based media. It has been in publication for over 40 years.

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Rhode Island School of Design:

http://map.stemtosteam.org/

From the website:

"Since its founding in 1877, RISD has consistently upheld its mission to educate the public about the vital role of art and design in society. Today, the RISD community remains committed to the belief that the arts and design, in concert with fields like science and technology, will bring about the global innovation needed in the 21st century. 

STEM to STEAM is a RISD-led initiative to add Art and Design to the national agenda of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) education and research in America. STEM + Art = STEAM. The goal is to foster the true innovation that comes with combining the mind of a scientist or technologist with that of an artist or designer."

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From their website:

The National Science Foundation Computer, Information Systems and Engineering directorate Intelligent Systems division (CISE IIS) sponsored three workshops in 2010 and 2011 bringing together artists, scientists and engineers from across the United States to address needs of the burgeoning community of researchers and practitioners that bridge Computer Science, Engineering and Creativity. 

These workshops were the genesis of two working groups. The first group is studying the research community in order to create a digital archive and resource for researchers, makers, and educators, called the "Virtual eXchange to Support Networks of Creativity and Innovation amongst Science, Engineering, Arts and Design (XSEAD)." 

The SEAD website is the outcome of a second group who has formed a national network of individuals, and is developing innovative methods for connecting and supporting this community across academia, non-profit organizations, industry, and funders, called "Network for Science, Engineering, Arts and Design (SEAD)."

SEAD published an excellent and intensive report on the subject in 2012, including input from dozens of worldwide advisors.

Among other stated goals of the paper, "The network facilitates experimentation with new methods, materials, and modes of creative inquiry and understanding in order to spawn groundbreaking discoveries and inventions.":

• Steps to an Ecology of Networked Knowledge and Innovation Enabling new forms of collaboration among sciences, engineering, arts, and design

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Worldwide network of artist's residencies

Res artist is a network of artist's residencies that you can use to publicize your FSML art program to connect with interested artists.

Their website also includes list of links to art information portals and other residency databases.

Another recommended resource is CaFÉ™, a web-based service that "allows organizations and administrators to easily and cost-effectively manage artist-application and jury processes related to calls for entry and other events."

CaFE is a program of The Western States Arts Federation (WESTAF), a regional nonprofit arts service organization based in Denver, CO, whose mission is "to strengthen the financial, organizational, and policy infrastructure of the arts in the West."

===================

Update: 

"The Alliance of Artists Communities is an international association of artists' residencies — a diverse field of more than 1,500 programs worldwide that support artists of any discipline in the development of new creative work."

Catalog of FSMLs

This fusion table is a remarkable effort to catalog all the field stations and marine labs in the world as part of the NAS report. It's an excellent resource for finding potential partners and identifying opportunities.

If you see any missing stations, please mention them in the comments (or e-mail me) and I'll update the post.

================

Missing stations...

From Fred Swanson:

• Senda Darwin at N end of Isla Chiloe, Chile;
• A Chilean network;