MUSIC MEETS SCIENCE

Science extrapolates meaning from the world through observation and experiment. Information deduced from these experiments inform our understanding of the world, but sometimes fail to engage with the aesthetic, with which we experience the world, particularly compared to the affective power of art and music.

“Science states meanings; art expresses them.
”

— John Dewey, educational philosopher

Dewey famously compared the molecular description of water — two hydrogen atoms combined with one oxygen — with our experience of water as a deep ocean, or a warm shower, or a cleansing drink.

This is not to privilege one domain over another, but rather to highlight the efficacy of science and art in concert. This is at the base of this research.

Professor Mary Finsterer from the Conservatorium of Music, University of Tasmania, has been developing her opera Antarctica collaborating with scientists from the Institute of Marine and Antarctic Studies, University of Tasmania

RESEARCH

Opera ANTARCTICA provides a platform of investigation for how scientific findings can be communicated through artistic expression; and music’s uniquely affective power to reveal science to itself in unexpected forms.

It brings together experts from music, visual arts, digital media, humanities, cultural studies and a multiplicity of fields within science to explore the intersections between disciplines. The process seeks to map out innovative ways of reimagining these fields in relation to the continent of Antarctica.

In July 2019, composer and CALE Creative Fellow, Professor Mary Finsterer, directed Opera Antarctica Symposium: FIRST LIGHT. This two-day forum was co-ordinated in association with Associate Professor Guy Williams and a team of scientists at IMAS. It included interviews, workshops, discussions and presentations by twenty specialists from a multiplicity of fields within science and the arts at the University of Tasmania and further afield in the creative industries.

The research, by way of graphical representation, raw data, audio and visual material and other relevant documentation, that was presented at the symposium has provided a premise for the creation of the libretto and music that constitutes the opera, ANTARCTICA. This research will also form the foundation for an installation which runs parallel to the opera. Entitled CIRCUMPOLAR it will function as a prism which dissects and reflects on the content of the opera including artistic inspiration, scientific data, storytelling & historical perspective.