CHArt Twenty-Second Annual Conference

A Blueprint of Bacterial Life - Can a Science-Art Fusion Move the Boundaries of Visual and Audio Interpretation?
Elaine Shemilt, University of Dundee, Scotland

Scientists from the Scottish Crop Research Institute have pioneered a method called Genome Diagram, which enables visualisation of billions of gene comparisons simultaneously between over 300 currently sequenced bacterial genomes, including those of human and animal pathogens. Our project takes this scientifically-challenging work outside the fields of biology and medicine and places it into the context of interdisciplinary art. Drawing from our previous work we reflect the dynamic nature of biological systems that arise from these static genome sequences. We explore such processes using both visual and sound methods.

Our research aims to have a consequential effect upon the future work of both the scientists and artists involved. The role of the artist should not be that of a mere illustrator: our interpretation of the data may have an effect upon the scientific research by enabling the recognition of new information and routes to new analysis. Similarly for the scientists the project aims to influence the direction of the art itself. As the process of abstraction influences the mode of visualisation, the form of visualisation affects the future process of abstraction, and we expect that greater insight of our own processes of deduction, and analysis of the data itself, will flow from this collaboration.

This project investigates how complex data and images used by the Genome Diagram, through interpretation and expression in a range of art forms, can help to develop and evolve the scientific tools themselves. This is achieved by utilising both modern printmaking and 2D/3D computer-generated imagery now combined with installation and sound. We are developing a multimedia installation based on the genetic plasticity and evolution of the bacterial pathogens. The aim is that the artistic interpretation will specifically not be an illustration or analogy of the data, rather an exploration of the influence of the surrounding spaces using both visual and sound feedback.

The unifying thread of our artist/scientist collaboration is that we begin from data of a biological nature, which also imply certain processes. By de-contextualising them, we obtain a complementary viewpoint to the biological interpretation that would ordinarily be enforced on those data and processes. Fine art practice emphasises subjectivity and ambiguity whereas science practice attempts to identify objective truths. Despite the contrast between the two approaches they are unified because both disciplines thrive on lateral thinking and observation.

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