What's it like to be part of a Science Gallery London season?
From student mediators to curatorial advisors, our seasons simply could not happen without input from staff and students at King's College London. Our new film ‘Engaging with Science Gallery London’ explores the impact of our creative collisions on the staff and students who get involved. Something Louise Weiss, our Public Engagement Manager, explores further in this blog.
Over 40,000 people got a flavour of the Science Gallery London experience during our 2016 pop-up season MOUTHY: Into the Orifice. Some cast their tongues, others created spit crystals or waxed lyrical about the larynx. None of this would have been possible without our research collaborators from King's College London.
Mediators encouraged MOUTHY audiences to engage with their mouths in new ways.
Throughout MOUTHY, our research collaborators worked with a range of artists, presenting them with unique experiences and opportunities. When else does a Professor of Craniofacial Development & Stem Cell Biology get the opportunity to explore their relationship with teeth through interactive performance theatre? Or a Dental PhD student get to design computer games controlled by their teeth?
Dr Flora Smyth Zahra, a Clinical Teacher at King’s College London's Dental Institute, performs in Teeth Showalongside artist Natasha Davies during the MOUTHY season.
But what impact did these creative collisions actually have on our research collaborators?
We had a few initial inklings – pushing researchers out of their comfort zone for one! But with a little more investigation it appeared that being part of a Science Gallery London season had much wider effects on our collaborators, both professionally and personally. Don’t just take our word for it though – you can hear it straight from the horse’s mouth, in our new film ‘Engaging with Science Gallery London’.
Brian Sutton from the Randall Division of Cell & Molecular Biophysics at King’s College London reflects on his collaboration with artist Inés Cámara Leret during Spit Crystal, as part of our new film ‘Engaging with Science Gallery London’.
Want to get involved?
If our film has wet your whistle there are plenty of ways to get involved. You can submit your own idea for one of our seasons through our Open Calls. Or, if BLOOD’s your thing, register your interest in being a research collaborator for our next pop-up season.
Beyond our seasonal programming, Engagement Services are here to support your public engagement practice. We provide free consultation on the public engagement (and Pathways to Impact) sections of research grant applications, and can even help deliver and evaluate your activities too. We work with departments to build engaging activities into events, conferences and training schemes, and are more than happy to come and speak to your department about engaging with Science Gallery London. Just say hello!
Early Career Researchers at King’s network with artists during our Collaborate & Engage training course (in partnership with King’s Graduate School).
January 26, 2017