Art 4 Science

Art4Science: The scientific work of the St. Anna Childrens Cancer Research Institute is to be made comprehensible and graspable through trialogue and interaction between science, art and general publicwith the interaction of the general public. A specially designed radio format contributes to a higher level dissemination. The starting point are four scientific FWF-financed reference projects. These are brought closer to artists from four different disciplines and transformed and presented by them in their respective genre. The audience will be involved in this interaction, thus forming an active trialog. Various artistic interaction methods will be applied, which each artist will use specifically for the respective PopUp lab-setting and location: e.g.: in a coffee house, shopping street, school, etc.. In this way, the complex scientific content can be experienced in an artistic process and the viewers are involved in the creation on site. In a radio series, artists and researchers enter the moderated public trialogue together with guests. The documented workflow and the various artistic interactions and translations are made public via various channels (website, streams, pics, exhibition and radio). An unprecedented connection between art and science in dialogue (trialogue with the public) serves to produce tangible and audible translations of scientific content. Highly complex research work is transformed into understandable and novel formats that are interactively designed together with viewers. This transformation from science to art can be followed by the viewer/listener in the long run and binds the audience sustainably to the process of creation.

The Art4Science project aims to make the topic of science more tangible and understandable by "translating" individual research approaches into works of art. To this end, four FWF lighthouse projects of St. Anna Children`s Cancer Research Institute were coupled with four different art forms: art, art photography, fashion design and music. The scientific project leaders teamed up with the respective artists in duos to present their research projects in intensive discussions. At mid-term of the project, the duos changed, so that each artist came into contact with two scientists and vice versa. Subsequently, artworks were created to accompany the research projects, which were intended to provide the public with easier access to scientific content and to stimulate discourse. The process of interaction between artists and scientists was also documented and published in numerous media in order to allow interested parties to participate in the process of creation. This also included overcoming difficulties of understanding and different strategies of cooperation. Especially the documentation of the creation process and the engagement with the artworks allows a better and lower-threshold access to the research topics than common science communication pathways, such as expert lectures with little interaction or a very high psychological barrier for many non-experts to participate in the discussion at all. The following science communication measures took place in the project: project website, radio series/podcasts, panel discussions in cooperation with the Wiener Zeitung, video, workshop and panel discussion at the Venice Biennale, production of music videos (YouTube), Long Night of Research (virtual and live), "Knowledge Huddle" (discussion round with representatives of the GRASP network) and project channels in the social networks (Facebook, Instagram). Art4Science left a very lasting impression on all participants and we consider the artworks created in the project to be extraordinarily successful. In particular, it should be emphasized that the two-way interaction was very important and that artists and scientists enriched each other`s work. The researchers confirm that the artistic realization of their work gave them new perspectives. Not only were they forced to simplify their content to such an extent that an artistic realization became possible in the first place. The questions and creative views of the artists also encouraged the scientists to look at their own research from other perspectives, which even led to one or the other new research question. The collaboration of the Art4Science duos and the resulting works are documented in detail on the website www.art4science.