Visualizing the Invisible: Art, Science and Observation

Catalog description

DINOSAURS, wilting plants, Jupiter’s moons and disembodied wombs– over the last few hundred years, thinkers have engaged with interdisciplinary methods across the arts and sciences in representing objects that have evaded the human eye. From anatomical theaters to observatories, natural history museums, labs, and rainforests, people have struggled with the politics and poetics of visualizing and communicating “invisible” objects – things that were too far away, too small, too ephemeral, too dead, or otherwise hidden from human sight. Asking how scientists and artists were trained to see, we will study the history of observation from the early modern period to the present. This class will include workshops at the Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology, the Nature Lab, and RISD’s glass studios. Students need not have any hands-on experience in the arts or sciences, but we will practice both in class.