An ambitious EC-funded research initiative on epigenetics advancing towards systems biology

Paul Liam Harrison

Dr. Paul Liam Harrison is the EpiGeneSys resident artist and a researcher at the University of Dundee, Visual Research Centre (VRC)Print Publishing facility. His research interests include an ongoing investigation into the relationships between art and science. Paul is particularly interested in the processing methods and visualisation systems applied to biological research data and information, both in a historical and contemporary context – and what alternative methods and systems might be appropriate in understanding what we are and how life functions.

In a workshop that was part of the 7th course of Epigenetics at the Institut Curie, and part of the EpiGeneSys training programme, Paul introduced some of his recent projects that have spanned the disciplines of art and science and discussed methods of visual representation. In a practical session, participants developed a series of images to visualize ideas and address the nature of Epigenetics in its visual form as a starting point for the development of an ongoing discussion towards a public exhibition.

Please check out the blog site dedicated to the EpiGeneSys Art & Science workshop held at the 2011 Annual Meeting in Vienna.

Epigenetic Imagin(in)g Workshop (10 March 2011): Download booklet of photos

Other items of interest

• Epigenetics inspires philosophical experiments, from Nature News Blogs
• The Cell Picture Show is a place to showcase striking images in cell, developmental, and molecular biology; a place to learn about cutting-edge research with beautiful images.
• Check out this breathtaking collaboration of art & science, a fashion collection that elucidates the first 1000 hours of life.
• Learn more about projects that cross many boundaries between art, science, engineering, new media, technology, architecture and education.
• The Art of the Science Tattoo - A popular science writer who has written a book about science-themed tattoos that reveals some of the surprises he encountered along the way.
  Scientific American, December 2011
• Book highlighting collaborations between artists and scientist
  The Scientist, September 2011
• Downloadable pdf article, "Why Science Needs Art" by Jonah Lehrer who is an editor at large for SEED magazine and author of Proust Was a Neuroscientist (Mariner, 2008).
• TED talk on using science for fashion, "Grow your own clothes".
• The project BLINDSPOT creates art objects and devices that seek to confront the symbolic value of perception both as contaminant and as part of the construction process of scientific knowledge.