Blip arts-science forum

home | about us | current programme | past programme | big blip festivals

Blip 20

Tuesday 27 April 2004 7.30pm - 11pm free

Cloud Dynamics: Perspectives from art and science

Panel discussion with Charlie Hooker, Maarten Ambaum, Giles Harrison, Inman Harvey, John Thornes and Michael O'Shea at 7.30 pm at the Sussex Arts Club, Brighton. This event was in associaton with the University of Brighton as part of Charlie Hooker's exhibition Rub-A-Dub/Wave Wall III at the University of Brighton Gallery during the Brighton Festival (12 - 30 May, 2004).

Charlie introduced the evening, outlined some of the main themes and described how he is collaborating with meteorologists on his latest project. The speakers then gave 15 minute talks about their particular areas of expertise relating to clouds. There will then be ample opportunity for general questions and discussion with the aim of pulling together some of the themes covered during the evening. The resulting cloud formation was very much dependent on the dynamic interactions between the audience and the panel members. It was also sensitive to initial conditions, with many people arriving early to have a drink before the presentations began at 8pm.

We also screened excerpts from Simon Faithfull's film 30km, which was made by attaching a camera to a weather balloon and releasing it into the atmosphere. The full installation of 30km was exhibited at the Aspex Gallery, Portsmouth until 19 June, 2004 and then at the Pumphouse Gallery in Battersea Park SW11 5 June - 25 July, 2004.

	Charlie Hooker is an internationally exhibited artist and also the Subject Leader for Fine Art Sculpture at the University of Brighton. Since the mid-1970's, he has made work which deliberately traverses recognised categories within the arts, including fusions of dance, music and theatre as well as sculpture and image-making. Charlie is currently working within Reading University's Departments of Meteorology, Music and Fine Art to develop an exhibition of images, audio-visual sculptures and a large-scale audio installation derived from global weather patterns.

	Maarten Ambaum is interested in the dynamics of the largest scales in the atmosphere from weather systems upward to the planetary scale. He also works on novel computation strategies for simulating the motion of the atmosphere and oceans. He talked about Global Clouds.

	Inman Harvey's research interests largely centre on the development of artificial evolution as an approach to the design of complex systems. Other interests include philosophical approaches to AI and Artificial Life (a non-representational, dynamical systems approach); passive dynamic walking; and Gaia theory. His presentation was called Head in the Clouds and it covered some of these interests as well as his experiences with weather systems as a pilot.

	Giles Harrison studies the electrical properties of clouds and aerosol particles, including releasing balloon-carried probes to make measurements within clouds. He also uses historical measurements of atmospheric electricity to investigate air pollution changes in European cities. His presentation was about Electrical Clouds.

	Michael O'Shea's research centres on the analysis of neural circuits in the brain of relatively simple invertebrate animals; neural mechanisms of insect vision; molecular biology of chemical neurotransmission; and the role of nitric oxide and other gaseous transmitters in neural information processing. In the brain there are the point-to-point connections between nerve cells (the wiring diagram) and a more nebulous communication system mediated by clouds of gas that move in space and time in complex ways that difficult to predict. He talked about Clouds in the Head where he explained how he is trying to understand the function of gases in the brain and in particular how to model the complex spatial and temporal dynamics of their spread. He also illustrated how this new aspect of neuroscience is inspiring the development of a new generation of artificial neural networks controlling the behavior of mobile autonomous robots.

	John Thornes studies atmospheric management; air pollution; the impact of weather and climate on transport and insurance; weather derivatives; and weather forecast verification. He also researches the paintings of Constable and Monet and their depiction of weather systems and he talked about Constable's Clouds. You can get John's book John Constable's Skies: A fusion of Art and Science for a discount price of £13.50 (incl. p&p) from here.

For further information email info@blip.me.uk

return to top of Blip 20