Presenting an academic artscience laboratory at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam

Presenting Hybrid Forms Laboratory: an artscience laboratory situated within the Faculty of Science of Vrije Universiteit. HF Lab serves as a laboratory for scientists and artists to collaborate on joint research. The lab is open to artists to incorporate scientific methods, and for students from all science and humanities disciplines – including art and design academies – to work on projects which all serve as test beds to develop transdisciplinary education and research. We showcase several projects in artscience to illustrate the breadth and depth of this unique laboratory and its occupants, dealing with voodoo in Senegal, black holes merging, artificial intelligence and dancing plants.

Video

© Iza Awad Organic Couture Fashion Show by Maarten Nauw

Hybrid Forms Lab, VU – Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Credit: V2

Hybrid Forms Lab, VU – Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Credit: Raoul Frese

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Credits

Raoul Frese, Manthia Diawara, Spela Petric, Dmitry Gelfand, Evelina Domnitch, Iza Awad, Christiaan Zwanikken Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam

Hypergravity Bio Portal

Christiaan Zwanikken (NL)

As part of the plant becomes a machine becomes a plant project of Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Gerrit Rietveld Academy, Waag Society, V2_the lab for unstable media and Zone2Source, Christiaan Zwanikken started an experiment to grow a variety of red-leaved basil plants under hyper-gravitational conditions. Hypergravity is able to stimulate plants at a cellular level and changes the physiology in interesting ways.

Science in Residency, some kind of voodoo

Manthia Diawara (US) and Raoul Frese (NL)

In order to flip the more usual format of collaboration between an artist and scientist, Raoul Frese has taken on a three-year residency with filmmaker Manthia Diawara. Invited by GLUON (Brux. Belgium), their starting point was the impact of artificial intelligence at the village of Yene near Dakar (Senegal).

Organic fashion: Chemistry and LHBTQ+

Iza Awad (NL)

In a world of rapid consumption, we constantly deplete natural resources to deliver new fashion trends. Iza Awad, a master’s student in chemistry, a joint degree of the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and University of Amsterdam, tackled this issue in his research project by producing fabrics from cellulose material that constantly grows in kombucha, a fermented tea drink. Awad also showed that the biopolymer is especially well suited to contain living plants and other photosynthetic organisms.

Merging experiences

Evelina Domnitch (BY, NL) and Dmitry Gelfand (NL)

Science is the source of inspiration for many of the artworks of Evelina Domnitch and Dmitry Gelfand. Scientists are also fascinated by art. A portrait of interactions merges the borders of disciplines from the perspective of the intriguing and the inquisitive.