More than 100 people braved the snowy weather to attend the opening reception of Empty Space: A LASP Artist in Residence Exhibition at the Boulder Public Library’s Canyon Gallery on Saturday afternoon, February 10. Community members were invited to view the work from artists, including a live dance performance and poetry reading. The event also featured a discussion with LASP researchers and the artists on how science and art are intertwined.
The exhibition is the culmination of work from the Empty Space: A LASP Artist in Residence Program, sponsored by LASP and the CU President’s Teaching Scholars Program through the Timmerhaus Fund, which supports faculty activities that promote public understanding of the value of CU degrees. The $30,000 award to David Brain, a researcher at LASP and chair of the Astrophysical & Planetary Science department, enabled three professional artists to learn over the last six months about the exciting space science research and innovative engineering happening at LASP.
“LASP is proud to support this new artist in residence program, which is helping to educate the community about the connections between art and science,” said Frank Eparvier, LASP’s associate director for science. “It’s been fascinating to witness the artists and the scientists at LASP seeing each other’s work through the other’s eyes, to see the similarities of their creative processes expressed through their different media.”
The exhibition features work from the program’s inaugural cohort of artists: Mario Miguel Echevarria, Alexandra Lockhart, and Clark Riley. Each artist was fully integrated into the lab and attended research meetings, even participating in the installation of instrumentation and hardware. The artists then produced artwork inspired by their time at the institute, in any medium they chose.
“Making these connections between art and science has been invigorating and thought provoking,” Lockhart said. “My creative process was driven by dialogue with the scientists and engineers, which deeply fueled my inspiration.”
The artists, along with LASP scientists and CU undergraduate students, also worked with local elementary school groups to explore how art and science are connected. Artwork produced by the students will also be on display at the Boulder Public Library’s Canyon Gallery through the end of March.
As part of the opening reception, a panel discussion with LASP researchers David Malaspina and Peter Tatum and the artists took place. The artists and scientists together answered a variety of questions including: “How can art be used to better communicate science?” and “What is solar wind and why was it an inspiration?” A particularly curious young audience member asked, “How was the Sun made?”
“I love questions like that,” said Tatum, a PhD candidate at LASP. “They really showcase that scientists and non-scientists all share the same natural curiosity. We just choose different ways to engage with that curiosity, whether a scientific approach or an art and performance-based approach.”
In addition to the ongoing art exhibition, Empty Space will host two more live performances by the artists paired with Q&A sessions presented by LASP scientists. The performances and science discussions will be held in the Boulder Public Library’s Canyon Gallery on February 24 and March 9 from 2:30-3:30 pm.
For more information about the exhibition, please visit: https://lasp.colorado.edu/events-and-outreach/artist-in-residence-exhibit/
By Willow Reed – Communications Specialist
