Roundtable 3 // Science & Art: Part One

Hello, this is the Techspressionism roundtable number 3. Today is June 12, 2024. My name is Michael Pierre Price. I'm an artist out of Phoenix, Arizona. Our topic today is kind of an interesting one. It's a collaboration between art and science with probably a specialization in oceanography. And I'll let our contributing artists here explain all of that. The artists that we have today, starting off, will be Cynthia DiDonato, followed up with Karen LaFleur. And our third artist is Cynthia Beth Rubin. And what we're going to do today is to talk... Talk a bit about what their projects have been that they've been working on several months with a particular scientist.

Michael Pierre Price

And after the presentations, we will go into a discussion about their projects, how it's impacted them, how it relates to Techspressionism and things of that nature. So, without wanting to waste too much time here,

Cynthia DiDonato, you have the microphone. Well, thank you, Michael. I'm going to share my screen. Today, I will begin with a brief history of Synergy II. For me, it began with Art League of Rhode Island. I've been a member for years. I've been a member for 10 years. And both Karen LaFleur and Cynthia Beth Rubin, who are with us today, are involved in the latest iteration of this scientist and artist collaboration.

Cynthia DiDonato

First, let me tell you a little bit about Art League and the history of Synergy. It began in 2020 as an offshoot of an exhibit titled Synergy, created by the MFT School of Art. Excuse me, MIT and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. And this occurred from 2013 to 2014. Then this new iteration of Synergy was first dubbed Synergy II. But now what we refer to as the original below the surface exhibition. So there's no confusion. Synergy II and below the surface are involved with the same kind of concept. In this new project, Art League Rhode Island teamed up with the HUEI graduate program of oceanography. The goal was the creation of a set of artworks to create a public interest in ocean science and discuss scientific concepts in a digestible way.

Cynthia DiDonato

Below the surface, one featured artwork of 11 teams of artists and scientists. And of course, each team focused to work together to create an aspect of the ocean scientists' particular research. Below the surface, two existed concurrently with below the surface one by interweaving artists from around the country. The present day Synergy II involves scientists and artists collaborations again, this time with the URI graduate program of the U.S. Institute of Science and Technology.

Cynthia DiDonato

And a very good one, a man, a man, a man! I have a man! I have a man! I have a man! I have a man! I have a man! I have a man! I have a man! I have a man! I have a man! I have a man! I have a man! I have a man! I have a man! I have a man! I have a man! Enough to be shown on the poster. So here's the work that I included. This work, however, was not part of an artist-scientist collaboration per se. Rather, I was asked to look at any topic that was involved with other artists' collaborations with scientists and come up with an image. So the image here also deals with the deep ocean. And although the deep ocean is often thought of as quiescent, it is actually the home to a substantial and intense bottom circulation and turbulent motions. The circulation is part of the great overturning circulation in which water in polar regions sinks to the bottom and flows from one basin to the next in a journey that may take a thousand years.

Cynthia DiDonato

You might ask what motivated me to join Synergy2. Well, first of all, I live in North Providence, Rhode Island. I've lived near the ocean all my life. And ocean science is fascinating to me. I always note the importance of protecting oceans for our planet's survival. And these days, that's even more important with climate change.

Cynthia DiDonato

I have a very good look-a-lid, a really good, a really? A really, a really, a really, a really, a really, a really, a really, a really, a really, ecosystem of deep sea vents through my visual art. My scientist collaborator is Michelle Haar. She is a PhD candidate at the University of Rhode Island Graduate School of Oceanography.

Cynthia DiDonato

She describes her research in this way. My research centers on the population genomics of microbial symbionts from endangered and vulnerable deep sea hydrothermal vent animals. Broadly, I am excited by projects that highlight the nuanced continuum of variation in nature. For example, strain level diversity within species and the often unclear fluid roles of viral infections from mutualist and non-multiple-cellular infections. Parasitics.

Cynthia DiDonato

Right now I will show you a trailer of my longer piece called Animating the Deep Sea.

I have a very good thing. I have a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really a really

Thank you for listening.

Thanks, Cynthia. Boy, I think I'm going to have some really interesting questions to follow up about your project in specific. Next up, we have Karen LaFleur.

Karen. Hello, everyone. Let me see if I can share my screen here quickly. And hopefully we can play. There we go. Full screen. As Cynthia said, I'm part of the Synergy project, but I'm also working out of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute with scientist Lucas Tenzer. And I also have worked in working with Nancy Tucker, who does all the animation. Music for my work. As a team working on a moving image artwork called Aqua Turbulentum. It's based on Lucas Tenzer's studies of how waters of coastal and open water origin intermingle and mix with one another. He strives to improve our understanding of how water exchange processes between the open and coastal ocean affect coastal ecosystems and communities in the New England through climate change.

Karen LaFleur

So Aqua Turbulentum speaks to water bodies and the boundary edges where whirlpools and eddies form. So the blue area you see here is the coastal water. The deeper orange is the open ocean water. And pretty much these water boundaries stay in their own yard. But when they do exchange, they do exchange on these eddies and whirlpools that exist.

Karen LaFleur

So. They're like a turbulent effect. What they do is they exchange different nutrients and particles with what they are measuring. Since it's more theoretical, Lucas and I first had to figure out a vocabulary, how to talk to each other from our own fields so that we would understand each other. And then the second point that became really important for us was to find a common point of creativity. On the left is the artwork of Casimir. And the quote says, Malavich's art focuses on subjectivity's implications for the comprehension of time, of the instantaneous, the successive, the momentary. And then the quote for Lucas Tanzer says Tanzer's mooring and the ocean robot might not be placed in exactly the right spot in space and time to identify one of the highly localized and turbulent exchange events.

Karen LaFleur

Where open and coastal waters swap places. Circumstantial evidence is typically much easier to observe and encourages Earth scientists to come up with creative ways to learn more about the Earth from our data. So we had our point of connection. This discussion period went from about November through till March. In March we started to build our actual environment for the moving image artwork. We also started to build the robots that simulate what Lucas uses in his own studies. Here's a couple of different ones that we built.

Karen LaFleur

And then we took those robots and we put them in an environment. And we sent those robots around to look around in this imaginary ocean just like scientists do in the real ocean to discover what is actually going on down there from their data. At this point. We started to put the data. Into our moving images. And at first we thought things were moving along just fine. But just in the last three or four weeks we realized that the data that we're using was over a year and even though it moves dynamically to show these eddy changes. We couldn't really show the whole year all at once. So we could only show about a month and a half. So we decided together now as a team not as an artist not as a scientist talking to each other but actually collaborating back and forth. Like what if we do this. What if we do that.

Karen LaFleur

So Lucas said let's go with the movement of the eddies because it's a lot more dynamic and when the pitches go up and down the audience can really see that these events are happening. So he sent me this data up above and then I started the animation on the chart below to show yep right there. There's an eddy happening. So then we looked at the math that he sent us which is about the swirling eddy and we decided well if it swirls. Let's swirl it. Let's do it for the audience because even if the audience doesn't understand the math they'll understand the dynamics that are happening. So I'm going to end here with my quick presentation showing you how we're taking an eddy along an ocean boundary of water. And you can begin to see this chart as the events happen. And then the math comes in to show that this actually human thought and passion to understand what's actually going on in this.

Karen LaFleur

Invisible world that has a huge effect on our oceans. But even though we're working with specific data what Lucas and I really want to do is present something that shows the beauty of these dynamics within the ocean so that the audience will fall in love with these things. And if they fall in love hopefully take care of the ocean. And I'm going to end my presentation right there as a mini intro.

Wow. Wow. Thanks. Thanks, Karen. That was I've got some good questions for you too. So I very fast. This is really fascinating. All right. So we

Will follow up here with Cynthia Beth Rubin. Okay, let me share my screen. I think I'm not sure what happened here. I'm going to have to stop my share for a minute. I seem to have lost what I left open. I'm okay. Okay. So I'm going to stop my share for a minute. Great. Is this working? Are you seeing my PDF here? Yes. Okay, great.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

So okay. So this is I like to start my presentations with a little bit of like what I'm getting to. So this is my most recent image. And what I'm doing in this project is treating the data collection done by Andrea Miller and other people in the Mendin Dura lab at the University of Rhode Island School of Oceanography. I am treating it as abstract form.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

And I will build to more explanation of this. I like to always be sure to include my thank yous here because everybody in the lab contributed in some way. My science partner is Andrea Miller, who's on the right. And this is a really good example. This was her research for her master's thesis, which she completed the year before we started working together. And the thank yous are really important here because none of this would have been possible without the microscopes from the Rhode Island School of Design and the long-term plankton project, which is the longest sampling of oceanographic plankton in the world that's been happening at the University of Rhode Island for a long time. And then the Techspressionism is going to be a little bit higher. So the oxygen is really important too. So this is what I see when I look under the microscope.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

This is just one kind of plankton. These are diatom chains that people know contribute more than half of the oxygen we breathe, if not up to 80%. They're at the bottom of the food chain. Without plankton, we die. This was my introduction many years ago. I've been working with the Mendin Dura lab for 10 years. Where? Over on the right. You see the diatom. You see an image that I was brought in to fix for publication of a predator-prey relationship. And I thought, well, that's a nice image, but it's not moving and dynamic. I mean, not in the ocean. And can I take this and make it wild? So making it wild is what I did. And I've been making things wild ever since. Here's an image that I did about five years ago of plankton that I drew back on top of. And this is hanging in the School of Oceanography now.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

The Dean's office. And I threw this slide in just to show that I am able to do this project because at some point I've done animations, I've done augmented reality, but I'm in a moment where I am returning to my kind of painterly roots, collaging, cutting up, and drawing. And that parallel project added so much to what I'm doing now.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

So here is Andrea's data that she collected over the course of the year. She's showing temperature changes, nutrient changes. And she came to me when she was presenting this for her master's thesis and said, how am I going to make this work? And I suggested colorizing through the year. And then we were off. You know, that sat with me for a year, but it took a while to decide what was the synergy project that said, okay, let's do more with it. So here is one of the graphs. And I, with experimenting, we decided to put it into a fluid, curvy form that would be artier. But you notice if you just colorize and overlap, what happens is that in the lower left, you're seeing green, which is actually continuous with the chlorophyll that's the darker reddish. In other words, plain overlapping doesn't work to give the correct science.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

And so I started making abstract forms. This is heat or temperature. This is chlorophyll, which I colorized actually using cloud textures. And I made it by itself because it's so beautiful. I love the chlorophyll the way it turned out. And this is salt, which the texture was actually derived from my own pictures under the electron scanning microscope. And this is in fact the picture that it came from.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

And then I started putting them together. So treating it like abstract form. And then I started putting them together. So treating it like abstract form. In this version, I'm showing a bit of the graphing, the months at the bottom, and the scientific material so that scientists will see this right away as the chart, but the general public will go, oh, that's a beautiful painting or beautiful print.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

And here it is without the scientific clues in it, the graph clues. So I like them both. I want to talk about one of the real challenges I had. So in this one, you can see that the graph clues are not the same. You can see there's an overlap of the nutrients. The nitrates and phosphate interwove. And that was really difficult to deal with. If I put one on top of the other, it didn't work. So I experimented. For me, this was kind of a breakthrough in my process. And I actually had to go in by hand and cut them back and forth and go back and forth. These are the kinds of things that look so simple to other people. But if you're the artist working on them, they are very complicated of making all the layers in Photoshop to cut through. And then this is the final image that I came up with. And I added ammonium as well as, of course, the flying plankton and some of the ones that floating plankton and some of the ones that I drew on the side.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

And it needed the ammonium to kind of hold back the temperature, which I've been told I should have always called temperature and not heat. But that was kind of too late in terms of the composition to change that. And the reason that I've been consistently using temperature is because it's the one thing that everyone knows. The nutrient stuff is a little bit abstract. So this is the latest image. These are stages in it. It was a challenge because I wanted to show the abundance of plankton. And that's the form that goes up off the edge on the left hand because there's so much of it. And I wanted to add silicates.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

Because I like to do too much. This is the final image. So the words are in there subtly. This one was a real challenge and wonderful thanks to the Expressionist group that gave feedback as I went along. And this is where I'm going to end. But in here, for me, the big breakthrough was figuring out how to have the plankton abundance just go off the chart. I mean, that was an interesting discussion we had. Because how do you show the abundance? You show something that's out of the chart. Well, as artists, we can kind of deal with that. We just go off the top and have it keep going. And I filled the texture. I made the texture out of plankton and put in a lot of plankton into the image.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

So that's where I am right now. So thank you.

And I will stop the share. Wow. Okay. Wow. So. Thank you. I have a good one. I have a really think. I have a really I you. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I.

I. I. I. I. I feel that this part of the project using the data that I started with is pretty close to finish. I have four images that I can exhibit and we have an exhibit coming up in August. I am interested in the whole concept of creating abstract form out of data. I see a lot of overlap with what Karen is doing and even I think the way that Cynthia is thinking of how do you make something that appeals to the scientist and stays scientifically accurate.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

At the same time, it's actually really arty. We've all seen a lot of imagery done, drawn from data. But this and the scientists, it's a difficult thing to really interweave it to appeal to both audiences. So I see this as something that I want to keep investigating this particular work with the data that Andrea collected from her master's thesis is pretty much completed.

Okay. Karen or Cynthia DiDonato?

Any, any. I'll go. Both Cynthia's are working through URI, which is a program that started, I believe, Cynthia, over a year or more ago. So they've had quite a while on their projects. Our project started in October, really. So, and now the exhibits are coming up in the summer. So we're on an accelerated scale. So I would say that we're three quarters of the way there. Still a work in progress.

And heading towards the finish line.

All right. Yes. And I'm, if Karen, are you finished? Yes. Okay. I'm probably 90% finished. I'm working on finishing up the longer animation, obviously. Meeting with my scientist next week. So she can look at the entire animation. And make comments. About what she thinks, you know, may be working or not working. And hopefully there won't be too many of those.

Cynthia DiDonato

So looking forward to that happening. I do want to say that the last part of my trailer did not come through. In which I too congratulated, thanked, many thanks to the Techspressionist co-working group. To Karen LaFleur, who was very instrumental as an animator. And also, you know, people within my family and friends. And of course URI and Art League Rhode Island. So all of those I do want to thank.

As well as my scientist, to say the least. That, okay. So that is a good segue into how has this collaboration experience affected you as an artist? I think it's a good segue into how I've been able to do this. I mean, I don't know that any of you have done something this intensive before. So I'm just kind of curious as an artist. What that meshing between not just science, but a particular, you know, area of expertise that the scientists have coming to you and saying, you know, let's do this collaboration.

How has that impacted you? For me, Michael, it's been, usually when I approach my artwork, it's pretty free form. You know, there are objects flying all over the screen because basically I'm moving with moving images. And I sort of do collage on the fly. But I love the ocean. I've always lived by the ocean. And I know it quite well from that point of view. But I think what Lucas Tenzer, the scientist at Woods Hole, has taught me. Is that I can look at that free form. And I can free form in a different way. I mean, I can free form to start. Then say, hey, what if I look at what's actually going on under the hood? And then free form that. So it's given me kind of a segue to free form a different way.

That's what I would say. Okay.

That's very interesting. And I would say it's impacted my art in that I have been working with animation for the last couple of years. And this has caused me to stretch. In terms of what I have done in the past. So I think that has been really important to me. Also, very important to me, which I mentioned earlier, is as a retired educator, educating the public about science is so important. And with art, between color and movement, we're able to attract people. And say, oh, here's a message that I perhaps would not have been able to enjoy or understand well. And yet here is something that works. And for me, the beauty of the deep sea, I think, is extremely attractive. And some people don't realize, you know, perhaps what resides there and how important it is.

Very good points. I. My situation is a little bit different because I had been working with the Men Endurer Lab for about ten years. And when this project came along, I mean, I wasn't sure I was going to continue because I had already done animations and augmented reality and the drawing that I showed you. But I felt intrigued by the idea that other people were doing it at the same time. So what this project has actually brought me is learning a lot from my experience. And it's been very rewarding. So I've been working with Karen and Cynthia who are here really valuing the input of the coworking group and of other artist friends who have looked at the work.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

So it's made me more open to a certain kind of feedback. Because there's something specific that

I'm communicating.

Yes. Yes. That makes perfect sense. One artist friend kept saying. Yes. She was saying, but it's art. Just move this thing over here. And I'm like, well, maybe the piece would look better that way.

But I can't quite do that. Right. Right. That's, again, really, really interesting, intriguing. Now, because Techspressionism is the platform that we're talking through here. In this roundtable. Technology. The use of technology obviously is a very key and critical part to make all of this happen. Were there any surprises? Any anything that you know? Aha moments for you in your collaborations?

Oh, again. We started off with his science and of course my animations he had seen before. But I began to realize working with him, I couldn't stay 2D. I had to go 3D. So the surprise for me was I had to learn 3D. I had to learn two or three soft words that I never thought I would encounter. And now that I have, I love bringing that into my work.

But no, it pushed me. Definitely. That's awesome.

That's really that's so cool to hear. Yeah. Cynthia. Well, learning about different kinds of graphing, we just think, oh, you graph it. So, and I showed Andrea's original graphs, which were interesting. But then when I said, can you output those so that I can use them? And then we had pointy graphs. And the pointy graphs didn't give such beautiful forms. I said, what happens if you make curved graphs? And that whole thing of developing a vocabulary of from just how to present the science visually so that I could work with it. And I wanted to mention that I relied heavily on Data Wrapper, which is a free online platform.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

And I do have them in the thank yous. What we ended up doing was that I would visualize something in Data Wrapper because I didn't have access to the graphs. And I would say, I want this graphing software that Andrea and the other scientists were using. And then I would say, I want something like this. And then she would have to re graph it.

Oh, interesting.

Okay. And then another little point here is communicating that I needed things as a PDF that a low resolution ping wouldn't work for stretching it. I don't have the patience that Karen has to redraw everything.

For me, the aha moment was coming up with imagery and film and other items to create a coherent narrative that shows the that transforms the deep sea imagery and conveys a real relationship between the microbial life in the vents and how it sustains other creatures at those depths. So that was a lot of research that I had to do on my part. And of course, Michelle was instrumental in directing me to where I might find such imagery. And she herself.

Cynthia DiDonato

Got permissions for me. And she was also able to help me to download video by the Schmidt Ocean Science Group, which again I thank to help with giving me some of those image images, because her images were not done in her lab. She had to rely on what's down there. She did get an opportunity to be on. One of those cruises where. The ROVs. I think if I'm saying that correctly to send to great depths and send up information to the cruiser above. And so I was relying on what she could tell me about that. And also what she could find a point me to do research. So there were many months of research. For sure.

So I'm, I'm really curious. And you've each hit on this to some degree, but I'm really curious about that feedback loop. Where. How did that work for you? What were there? How much did you have to kind of put the scientists helmet on? And how much did the scientists have to put the art helmet on? And.

Michael Pierre Price

You know, work between. What was important from. The pure science standpoint. What was interesting to you from an artist to, to demonstrate. That. And then. How do you see this? Impacting. A greater audience who might be. Going to. You know, the exhibitions that, that. You know, you've done. You've done in your career. You're having through this?

Michael Pierre Price

Because at, you know, each of you have indicated that there's some rather abstract qualities to the research. Because it's, you know, it can, it can feel like. What the heck is all of this about? And, and you're. You've each expressed that you want to. Be able to. See the results of your research. Bring in the public to a larger degree to appreciate. What this research is all about. So I'm just kind of curious about how that, how that feedback loop worked and how do you think? You know, Looking at the final product or anticipating what the final product may be and the impact that it might have. I know that's a lot to unpack, but you can address any of those aspects that you might like to.

Yeah. Karen. I guess we have a pattern going here, so I'll go first. I don't know if we've really explained the process of actually matching with a scientist. But you get into this program and they explain the whole thing. And then we're all kind of like deer in the headlights and they say, we do this speed dating thing. Where you just get in this zoom meeting and you run around and talk to as many people as you can. And then you connect with people. You think you. You might have interest in their project. And so it starts with this first impression and where Lucas and I really connected was on this squirrels in my work. He attached to. Then the conversation went to who are we? And I started to tell him about, I had a boat as a kid, as many of the Techspressionists know, and I would be in the marshes.

Karen LaFleur

Well, you can't see anything at low tide. It's like nine feet above you. And the only way I could navigate was to put my hand into the water, to feel the difference between the cold and the warm water, which was stronger in order to navigate myself into the outgoing channel. He picked up on that immediately. And we started talking about water bodies. So it really started from this tangible spot. Then it was like I said, in my talk about learning each other's language and going from there. When we got to the stage where we could have talked to each other, we both had to give up certain things to gain certain things. You know, so the project became the focus. And so that's where we became a team working for the project. And as far as the public goes, we both love the ocean. So we want them to fall in love even with these invisible parts.

All right. Awesome. That's, that's really a nice behind the scenes kind of look at that. Thanks, Karen. It was tough to match.

Yeah. I think it was easier for me in that we had a large meeting on the URI campus at the school of oceanography and scientists were brought into the meeting. Artists were brought into the meeting and we began talking to one another about, you know, what we do in particular, what the scientists do and what artists enjoy doing. Well, at that time, I listened to Michelle and her, her discussion about her work with deep sea vents. And I was immediately attracted to that because again, a great lover of science and PBS and my first encounter with two worms was on PBS. So I said, oh, wow. I, I think I want to work with her. Well, she immediately was work, started talking to another artist.

Cynthia DiDonato

And I said, wow, Oh dear. Maybe I won't get to work with her. So sure enough when the meeting broke up and people started talking to one another. I went over to Michelle and said, oh, I'm very interested in your work, but I can see you're already talking to another artist and I don't want it to fit. Oh no join up China. So then the three of us began talking and how we were tad different takes on what she was doing. So then she said, I'm so glad you came over because I read the description that was sent out by Art League about your art. And I'm very interested in, you know, digital art and animation and the rest. So we both clicked there. But obviously, later on, it's a matter of, well, what are we going to make happen?

Cynthia DiDonato

Certainly she knew I wanted to make an animation. What are we going to put in it? What's going to be the focus? What story are we going to tell? And so that took time. And we finally, I guess after several months, nailed something down. And she let me go to work with the project and I would check in periodically to show her to make sure that I'm not erring, erring, erring, excuse me, when it came to the science. So that's pretty much what happened with us.

But it was a very exciting beginning for me. That's wonderful. That's very, very cool. I love I love these details.

This is really good. So my situation was completely different because I was already working with the Mendendura Lab. And that came about because I had been teaching at Rhode Island School of Design. And when RISD got high powered microscopes, not the really fancy one that I showed you the shot from, but there was other ones before that, that are still there. That were pretty good. And so I integrated the microscopy into my teaching. And at that point, Neil Overstrom, who was the director of the RISD Nature Lab, said, you have to hook up with Tatiana Rierson and Suzanne Mendendure.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

And I eventually became the artist in residence. The non-salaried, but affiliate artist. And I became the artist for the Mendendura Lab. And that means that I've been attending as many lab meetings as my schedule has allowed me over many years. And it's a little bit like getting a graduate education. I mean, I'm not doing what the grad students do. I'm not measuring things. I'm not conducting experiments. But I have learned a lot along the way. So it's a different situation. So when Cynthia DiDonato told me about the project, I felt I'm already doing it. So I want to get into it. But it's very different being part of the group, as I just mentioned.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

This group has been wonderful. The text practice has been so wonderful.

That's really cool. So we have about 10, 15 minutes left. I'm really curious about. How this has stretched your creativity as an artist. And I know you've talked a little bit about some of those aspects. But I'm just, I'm really curious. Moving forward. Just in working on your art. Has this experience, do you think it's affected you? Do you?

Michael Pierre Price

Again, artists. We rely on our creativity. And I think our creativity is a hallmark that we're artists to begin with. But I'm just kind of curious as to the impact that this has had. Potentially you moving forward in just the artwork that you, that you work on. Independent of this potential project.

I think Michael it's demystified things for me. And so I always thought. How so? I live near Woods Hole. So Woods Hole is there, the scientists and everything. And even though I've worked with aquariums that rescued whales and everything else, it was still art was here and science was there. So it demystified to the point that I understand how creatively they are, have to think in order to get the data that they need to find. And bridging that gap really has helped me. I think in a lot of ways for my art. To be able to jump. Feet first into things a little quicker now.

Because of the experience. Well. Besides just learning new software to get things.

That too.

Yeah. For me too. I think of course it has stretched my creativity. As I said, I've gotten more involved with. Animation. And learning things about animation that I did not know. Being relatively new. After two years of working with it. So that has really helped my creativity. Within animation. But the other thing I think that's very profound is the concept of working. As a collaboration.

Cynthia DiDonato

As an artist. I'm used to working alone. On what I do. But to work with someone else. And again, someone else who's not an artist. Is. I think that's. Probably one of the biggest challenges. I've had. When it comes to my creativity. And being able to translate. Concepts. That I did not know about before. Maybe I knew about them generally, but not specifically.

Cynthia DiDonato

Is. You know, a change. A big change. And I. Want to do more collaboration. That's what's happened. To me. I would look forward to more collaboration. Because I think there is something.

Quite wonderful about it.

And I. I thank Michelle. My scientist for.

Being willing to work with me. Cool.

That's awesome. So I think one of the things that's happened to me. Is. Understanding more of the limitations of different ways of thinking. So you show these complex. And I think that's. One of the things that's happened to me. Is that I've. I've been able to. To. To. To. To. To. To. To do something new and different and different from how we usually would do things in art. This is the way some of us think the way you think is wonderful. We love it. It contributes to science. And the way artists think is.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

And maybe the general public is extremely different and yet. How do we create that bridge? Because I didn't want to just go wild. I mean, we all have seen also probably artwork that's built on science and you can't see the science in it anymore. So, and then we've seen stuff that's supposedly integrating it. But I think that this group, because we had time and we knew that there would be an exhibit at the end, maybe we really, people have been striving for a different way of integrating different ways of thinking.

That's really interesting. So that brings me to my next to the last question. And that is the union of art and science. And I mean, to me, they're two sides of the same endeavor in a lot of ways. And I'm just curious, just briefly, do you have a new sensibility about art and science?

Do you, do you have a new sense of what art is and what science is through your experience? I definitely have a new sense. I think the marriage of art and science is imperative. If we're going to, for the future of the planet and the fact that science deals with truth and art also attempts to deal with truth.

And so I think they are a wonderful pairing. That's a great insight. And I agree with you very, very strongly.

Thanks, Cynthia. I agree totally with what Cynthia just said. And again, I thank Lucas Tenzer for all his input on this project. He's taught me so much more about the ocean than I ever thought I would ever know, even though I live next to it. And also for Nancy to bring in the soundscape, which is a whole different topic.

Karen LaFleur

But at the same time, there's that, like I said before, this demystifying so that art and science are part and parcel of the same thing. And when some of the people, especially in my team with the Woods Hole group, they're doing their PhDs at the same time. They're giving conferences. And their interest in art, to be able to dialogue the science back to the public, is very, very strong. So the bridge is there. We just need to have more programs like Synergy to get us together, really.

Yeah. So I feel like I'm a little bit the voice of dissent here in some ways. Because I think that we do some very different things in terms of artists focusing on aesthetic and prioritizing visual relationships in a way. And the scientists are working on structure and structural relationships. So the challenge to integrate those, I think, is, is still before us. Although, Okay.

We don't have many examples of it that are successful.

Okay. But I also think that scientists need to see and understand art and incorporate it within their work. Because as was mentioned earlier, I think it was Cynthia or maybe Karen or both of you, that it's important to have different ways of seeing. Because the different ways of seeing, can bring about changes within their science and certainly changes within our art. Hmm. Definitely.

Definitely. And not to, not to, you know, to give you a bird's eye view into the program that I'm with, there are 13 scientists from Woods Hole that signed up for this project. Wow. So it's not just one or two.

Right. So. But I guess my question would be, were there, were they excited about it being really challenging art? Or did they initially think that it was going to be more illustration or what we generally think of as straight data visualization, which is just traditionally different ways of creating graphs, which has its own wonderful exploratory group.

Oh, that's a great point. Yeah. It is. And I can only speak from the group that I've been in, Cynthia. And maybe because there's a little history with that, but there's a little history with that. Doing this program now. They can kind of see what was done before. So they'll jump. But every scientist is we're all in one group together. We have meetings. And they are so interested in the ways that art can communicate what they do because they feel like they want to get it to the public in a way that the public.

Karen LaFleur

Can start to engage with what they're doing. So there. I, the enthusiasm surprised me is my point of view. I thought it was going to be no illustrate this.

No, they want a collaboration. Yeah. And the enthusiasm was evident. In my very first meeting. With in-person. The fact that, that many of them. At who are you, are I, and not only pursuing. Their PhD. Some of them are also full-time in the classroom. And yet they found time to come meet. With us. And. Discuss. That this very issue.

About educating the public. That's wonderful. Okay. So. We're getting close to needing to wrap up. I don't know if you're prepared to do this, but I was hoping, maybe each of you. Could share your screen. One last time, maybe with one. Piece. One image, either your final image or something you're working on and just share a final thought. It. Can be as profound or unprofound. A.O. Going to share one image or something if we could. Whichever image we wanted it to be as profound as you want it to be.

Michael Pierre Price

And maybe Cynthia since Cynthia DiDonato, since you're on screen. Do you want you? Would you be willing to share one bar?

One more image or one of your images?

An image you haven't already seen?

One that you showed.

Okay. All right. And just any final thought. Good.

Bad. Ugly. Whatever. Is an image that I really, really am very fond of that deals with the jellyfish in the ocean depth. And the repetition of the jellyfish fascinated me. And that's why I created this particular image. So I will leave you with this because it's the one I love the best.

Cool. Thank you. I appreciate that.

So I'll share a final image here.

It just might take me a second to get to it. That's okay.

Don't worry about it.

Because we're out of order.

That's fair. Okay. Zoom is in the way. Okay. Zoom, finally, you give me a chance to play the slideshow. I'm going to end with this animation because I love it. It's our epiphany point together when we brought the math, the science, the beauty, of this swirling eddy. Just I loved it when I created it on the screen. So I'll leave the audience with this one to mesmerize them.

Beautiful.

Thank you, Karen.

There you go. And I am going to share this one because it's my last one. And one of the things that I love about this is I did this one after I had been to see the I used the really high powered electron scanning microscope. So I have some interesting imagery of plankton in there and it solved the problem of plankton abundance going off. By the way, the year that we're following here, as you can tell from looking at temperature, summer is in the middle. It's winter. Okay. And so then in the winter, plankton just went off the charts. And that was an interesting, I like this because of the problem solving that the silicate I used as a transparency on top, but had to change the colors quite a bit. And some of the deciding when to outline forms and when to just let them sit. So here the plankton abundance is outlined.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

And I didn't say this before. The bottom, is actually broken plankton. So they fall to the bottom and their shells disintegrate and become, shell isn't really the right word, but they become part of the ocean environment. And so there they are down at the bottom, these broken diatom chains. They look like creatures, but they're actually individuals chained together. So the translucency in this and the fact that it has temperature and that it has the guys and plankton moving around and that it feels like you're in the ocean came

Together for me. So.

Awesome.

Stop my share. Well, this has been fascinating and I really, really am honored and grateful for the three of you to join me today in sharing your experience. And with that, I am going to sign us off.