Say it isn’t so

The sciences have always been a subject and source of inspiration for artists. William Turner was interested in geology, Georges Seurat was inspired by studies of physicists James Clerk Maxwell and Ogden Rood, Wassily Kandinsky was fascinated by new discoveries in atomic physics and Robert Smithson dealt with entropy and the laws of thermodynamics – to name just a few examples among many. The sciences influenced the artistic language of form, provided the know-how for the execution of certain works of art, were declared art, synthesized with art and criticized by art.

Since the end of the last millennium, a striking number of artists have been inflamed by a renewed interest in the natural sciences. They botanize plants, typify cow stains, build observation stations for insects, attempt to communicate with frogs in open laboratory situations, or evoke feelings of happiness in test subjects in experimental setups. They make use of scientific jargon, scientific forms of illustration, or create idiosyncratic models.

The Weserburg is investigating this current phenomenon in the form of an exhibition, consciously setting itself apart from previous projects and symposia on the topic of “art and science.” While these often aimed at discovering commonalities between art and science or at forcing a dialogue between the “two cultures” (Charles Percy Snow), the planned exhibition takes into account that contemporary art is by no means moving ever closer to science or even becoming absorbed in it, but rather is placing itself next to it with an appraising gaze.

In this respect, it will not be a matter of “rethinking the alliance of art and science” as in the exhibition Science + Fiction (Hannover et al. 2003) or primarily of forcing cooperation between artists and scientists as in Formule 2 (Amsterdam 1998). Nor is it intended to focus on a specific discipline such as genetic research (Put on your Blue Genes, Berlin 2005). Rather, in line with current discourse, the exhibition aims to show how contemporary artists reflect on and transform the natural sciences from their own sometimes critical standpoint. They thus contribute to an expanded understanding of the sciences and their role in our culture. At the same time, they question their claim to universality and objectivity.

The artists are supported and inspired in their work by authors such as Bruno Latour and Donna Haraway, with whom they share an analytical and cultural anthropological view of Western science. Artistic strategies employed are those of affirmation, fakery, and irony. The artists never set themselves up as judges of the natural sciences, whose dazzling fascination they themselves can hardly escape.

For some time now, the natural scientists themselves have begun to understand their disciplines as dependent on a cultural context and to think critically about the framework conditions of their own research work. They allow, if you will, a kind of “aesthetic distance” to their own thinking and doing. The molecular biologist, historian of science, and Derrida student Hans-Jörg Rheinberger has already pointed to a self-reflection of the natural sciences – albeit still very hesitant at the present time – that resembles that of the arts. Here the connection between art and science begins to become interesting in a way not yet imagined. On the one hand, there is increasingly the artistic experimenter who explores the field of science and conceives of his works as epistemic objects; on the other hand, there is the scientist who, like an artist or philosopher, begins to reconsider his practice. This interrelationship, which is only now becoming virulent, will also be incorporated into the exhibition and catalog.

SAY IT ISN’T SO sees itself as a multimedia exhibition. It shows laboratory-like installations, experimental arrangements, archives, photographic and video works in which art as an experimental system, as a transformation of scientific questions, but also as a sensual-aesthetic event takes center stage. By intensively familiarizing themselves with the forms of thought, the experimental procedures, but also with the system of mediation and presentation methods of the natural sciences, the participating artists are able to place these on a new level of reflection. By making scientific models of thought experienceable from an aesthetic distance necessary for art, they transfer a science-believing thinking to a necessary revision.

In the exhibition, artistic positions of the 1990s, such as works by Mark Dion (USA), John Isaacs (GB), Olaf Nicolai (D) or Nana Petzet (D), are juxtaposed with very current artistic works and attitudes. The latter not only point to the explosive nature of the described topic for the youngest generation of artists, but also show the direction in which the future discourse of art and science could develop, which will not only be of great interest for the art world.

The concept of SAY IT ISN’T SO was prepared over 3 semesters in a seminar conducted by Peter Friese and Guido Boulboullé within the Art Studies program at the University of Bremen. It was also developed in close collaboration with Susanne Witzgall from the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich, who is a proven expert on the subject. Thus SAY IT ISN’T SO is not just a museum event limited to the art world, but a research project resting on several shoulders, which has its undisputed center in the exhibition, but will be accompanied by lectures, artist talks and various mediation offers.