Call for Artists to turn Science into Art - University of Exeter

We invite artists to submit a proposal with costings to join part of an innovative science team at the University of Exeter. The artist will join an EU funded project called ECOFLAM, part of which seeks to use art to convey the results of scientific research.

The Science

Wildfires have been part of our planet’s history for 410 million years. Throughout this long history the types of plants that have dominated Earth’s ecosystems has changed, which has influenced the type and nature of wildfires. ECOFLAM combines state-of-the-art flammability experiments with palaeontological observations of fossil plants to create estimates of the nature of ancient fires for 5 key periods in the history of our planet. It will consider whether the dominant wildfires were slow moving fires creeping through leaf litter or whether they were hot, ferocious and fast spreading fires ravaging the canopy of the trees. This distinction is important because the nature of fires influences the ability of ecosystems to recover following a fire as well as chemical cycles that operate on our planet. The project aims to determine the importance of changes in fires in the history of our ecosystems.

Artistic Exploration

We aim to explore how art can be used to represent scientific ideas. The artist will work with the team leader Dr Claire Belcher to create artistic visions of the research results. At the end of the project the team will hold an exhibition of the works at U. Exeter.

ECOFLAM will run for 5-year period. The successful artist will be subcontracted to U. Exeter. We will consider bids in the region of £10,000 for the whole project. Further budget exists for exhibition costs. Interested artists should submit an outline of how they would represent the work (limit 1000 words); send a breakdown of their fees for undertaking the project plus CV and cover letter that highlights their suitability and previous experience.

Application deadline = 30/10/2013. Please send applications to:

Claire Belcher c.belcher[at]exeter.ac.uk