Art and Science - Flat Earth Book

At the end of the Art and Science module I inexplicably decided I wanted to screenprint a 12-page, 2-colour book of evidence and bind and emboss the cover to be a part of the installation...

I trawled through a lot of old books published on the Flat Earth Society website as well as looking at Twitter for a modern perspective on the Flat Earth. I liked the idea that writing something down and printed it made it more official and with this in mind I made separations for the screenprinted book combining text and diagrams from the research I'd been doing and the handwritten quotes from Twitter. I like the idea of taking a quotation out of quotation marks making it into my own words.

I chose to use green ink for the writing as a reference to the journalistic joke about the green-ink brigade - possibly too obscure a joke but never mind.

Screenprinting the book was easier than I expected - I thought it would be a nightmare as it's double sided so had to be lined up accurately but it came out well. I wanted it to be properly bound so it looked official so I used binding cloth and used gold leaf for the title on the cover (I eventually decided against embossing as I was running out of time). It was my first time using binding cloth and gold leaf so I'm proud of the finished I achieved.

Art and Science - Flat Earth Project

This semester has been a bit different as I've been doing an elective module - Art and Science - alongside my core illustration work which has made a nice change. It took me a while to get into it as there was no brief for the module which was initially intimidating for me as a designer, however now I'm really enjoying the freedom that's given me.

Initially I did quite a lot of research. I spoke with a couple of scientists - a biochemist working on sleeping sickness and a physicist who specialises in ultrafast photonics.

I enjoyed talking about physics as I loved it at school but I didn't want to do anything too serious for the project. I went to see the Turner Prize exhibition in Glasgow and was inspired by Bonnie Camplin's installation. I liked the idea of finding evidence for something and that people can prove anything if they omit certain facts and highlight others. This sparked a memory of an article I'd read years ago about the Flat Earth Society who are basically just a group of people who believe the earth is flat. I started looking into flat earth theory and thinking about how you could go about proving it.

I spoke to David (the physicist I had had an initial conversation with) about it and obviously he was pretty flabbergasted at the whole idea and really struggled with how he would go about finding evidence for the flat earth. I then recorded him and his friend Adam (another physicist) discussing how to prove that the earth was flat.

I considered what visual evidence you could use in support of flat earth theory - most of it pretty simple - for example, everyone is standing up, water is level etc (flat earth believers don't believe in gravity). I started working on some acetone transfers with screen prints using photos I'd found in encyclopedias and my own scribbly diagrams and writing.

I decided I wanted to create an installation of flat earth theory incorporating the recorded conversation with my prints and objects. As the final exhibition for the module would be in the life sciences building which isn't an ideal space I decided to create a wooden structure which I would be free to paint and stick things onto so I didn't have to compromise my idea.

scale model

Universe Journal

“We inhabit a universe where atoms are made in the centers of stars; where each second a thousand suns are born; where life is sparked by sunlight and lightning in the airs and waters of youthful planets; where the raw material for biological evolution is sometimes made by the explosion of a star halfway across the Milky Way; where a thing as beautiful as a galaxy is formed a hundred billion times - a Cosmos of quasars and quarks, snowflakes and fireflies, where there may be black holes and other universe and extraterrestrial civilizations whose radio messages are at this moment reaching the Earth. How pallid by comparison are the pretensions of superstition and pseudoscience; how important it is for us to pursue and understand science, that characteristically human endeavor. ” 

Carl Sagan, Cosmos

The project I did on the big bang is one I suspect I will keep revisiting. Recently I found an amazing quote by Carl Sagan which summed up everything I feel about science and decided to incorporate a shortened version into another book.

This book was pretty simply made, I just wanted to test out an idea I had about using holes to show expansion.

I used fineline pen and a ruler to draw out the lines, collage, and watercolours.

I like the way the image builds up and almost creates a mirror image effect.

I finished the book off using a photo I had taken of my friend Maya at Mills Observatory in Dundee, which I had liked but hadn't found a use for yet. I liked the shadow clock and thinking about the different ways that people try and chart time.

Universe Book Project

One of my favourite briefs this year was having to produce an illustrated story. I decided to combine my interests in art and physics and make a universe creation story. I started off by doing a bit of research into the big bang. What I found fascinating about the scientific and philosophical theories I looked at was that so many centred around the idea that humans are the reason for and hence the creators of the universe. I tried to combine some ideas from quantum theory and the anthropic principle with religious creation theories to highlight that both science and religion are, to varying degrees, leaps of faith, and also to show my conclusion that that everyone needs to be important, to some extent, to be "God".

I produced a series of illustrations in my A4 sketchbook, then printed off scans of them and made a little A6 book. I found illustrating these abstract concepts challenging but very enjoyable. Here is the result.