Art Sci Lab Research Group School of Creative Arts
Art Sci Lab
The Art_Sci Lab was established in 2021 to lead on research in the domain of art and science collaboration. Its remit is to reassert art as a knowledge forming discipline in its own right and in doing so, take a leading role in art / science collaborations. The Art:Sci Research Lab seeks to find ways in which a meaningful co-creation can be achieved, equitably between disciplines. In doing so we seek to discovers what alternative forms can be created in the interstices of the collaborative process. What new knowledge emerges when we embrace transdisciplinary ‘entanglement’ (Barad, 2006) with the potential to for greater societal value in the context of complex, existential threats such as global warming and AI.
The Art Sci Lab conducts collaborative research on artist-led cross-disciplinary research with scientists.
We work with science across the spectrum, including:
- the hard sciences (eg physics, chemistry, ecology),
- the social sciences (eg psychology, anthropology, economics),
- and the applied sciences (eg engineering, computer modelling).
The lab is inclusive with an open door policy for colleagues, peers and future collaborations with artists, curators, scholars, scientists, policy makers and industry.
Art Sci Lab
- is artist-led, promoting art practice as its own research methodology
- aims to be methodologically rigorous an artistically excellent
- is underpinned by bilateral and (ideally) symmetrical collaboration between artists and scientists
- research outputs include exhibitions, artworks, publications
- seeks authentic co-creation where some outputs maybe less definable.
- operates ethical engagements in collaboration.
Research Supervision
The University of Hertfordshire offers both PhD in Creative Arts and a Professional Doctorate in Fine Art (DFA) and welcome applications from creative practitioners working in the arena of art and science. Periodically, the Art:Sci Lab offers a bursaried DFA for researchers wishing to work alongside specific projects. Information on these bursaries will be advertised when available.
Sam Jury
Lead
Artist, Sam Jury, leads the Art Sci Lab with composer and sound designer, Rob Godman.
Sam's research includes the impact of slow violence and trauma in post-conflict situations, and she is working with University of Hertfordshire psychologists on a project exploring repetition with those have Tourette's Syndrome. She is currently Principal Investigator on AHRC Network Grant, Visual Arts and Theatre Collaboration - new models for art practices in post-conflict situations, and won AHRC Research in Film Award in 2019.
Rob Godman
Lead
Rob is Reader in Music at the University of Hertfordshire, the group leader for Creative Arts Practice Research Group, leads the Art Sci Lab with Sam Jury.
Working as a composer, sound designer and programmer, Rob has a passionate interest in how sound behaves acoustically and has developed a number of techniques for controlling and building virtual spaces for use within live performance and installation. Rob is involved in a series of projects with the clarinettist and producer Kate Romano (CEO Stapleford Granary). These have included a new realisation and performance of Poeme Electronique by Varese and his companion composition - Faraday Waves, for live sound projection and video (which images created in collaboration with Prof. Stephen Morris, Physics Department, University of Toronto and Sam Jury).
Rob will lead the Art Sci Lecture Series.
Meet The Team
- Art historian Dr Steven Adams (Associate Professor)
- Composer Rob Godman (Reader)
- Artist Simeon Nelson (Professor of Sculpture)
- Writer and curator Dr Bronac Ferran (Research Fellow)
- Artist Hannah Dargavel-Leafe
- Artist and curator Elizabeth Murton
Key Collaborators
We regularly work with artist, Sebastian Utzni (University of Lucerne) as well as other artists, designers and historians at University of Hertfordshire and the following University of Hertfordshire scientists:
- Dr Ian Johnston
- Dr Christabel Tan
- Dr Laura Urbano
- Dr Loic Coudron (Reader in Digital Microfluidics)
- Dr Amanda Ludlow (Psychology)
- UH Arts and Culture
External Partnerships
Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts (HLSU), Switzerland
French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission (CEA), France
Stapleford Granary, Cambridge