In early September, Holly Schmidt, the Outdoor Art Program artist in residence at the Belkin, guided a sensorial walk with the Ars Scientia research cluster. Exploring the different areas of UBC Farm, she took artists and physicists through various exercises in sound, smell and touch within the natural landscape of the forested area. Written scores, sculptures and even new vocabulary for describing sensorial experience were made and shared, bringing attention to the various channels through which observation is conducted in the respective, yet often connected disciplines of art and science.
Schmidt’s Vegetal Encounters residency at the Belkin is a multi-year endeavour in which she creatively engages with and learns from plant life. She has created opportunities for students, staff and faculty on campus to share time and space with the natural world, resulting in art projects of various media and iterations.
Photos (above): Marcus Prasad
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The long search for dark matter has put the spotlight on the limitations of human knowledge and technological capability. Confronted with the shortcomings of our established modes of detecting, diagnosing and testing, the search beckons the creation of new ways of learning and knowing. Fusing the praxes of arts and science in the emergent fields of interdisciplinary research, Ars Scientia, a tripartite partnership between UBC's Stewart Blusson Quantum Matter Institute (Blusson QMI), the Department of Physics and Astronomy and the Belkin, presents an opportunity to foster new modes of knowledge exchange across the arts, sciences and their pedagogies. Funded by UBC’s Research Excellence Cluster program, Ars Scientia will conduct rich programming and research to address this line of inquiry over the next two years beginning in 2021.
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Vegetal Encounters is Holly Schmidt’s three-year residency with the Outdoor Art Program at UBC. Through this residency, Schmidt has been creatively engaging with plant life as a significant source of life, connection and learning.
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Download and print the sensorial workshop Holly Schmidt devised for UBC mycology students and enjoy nature a little differently.[more]Jana Tyner