How we can properly call art “science" — Part 1

Today, few artists explicitly use the scientific method, but that doesn’t impede the public from perceiving certain works of art as being more ‘scientific’ than others. To preserve the integrity of science, however, it’s necessary to spell out the terms we use to define it.

we should not fall victim to embracing red herrings which are dressed up like science.

Our definition of science at NAPA:

Science is the intellectual and practical activity encompassing the systematic study of the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world through observation, hypothesis formulation, experimentation, documentation, and publication (Oxford Dictionaries). Furthermore, the term science is synonymous with ‘the scientific method’, and should be regarded as an act, not a field. In short, science should be understood as a mode of inquiry and an approach to the production of knowledge.

Based on these terms, disambiguating what leads us—the public—to readily but uncritically call art ‘science’ is a matter of testing our initial impressions against the scientific method.

This sentiment is the catalyst behind this first post of a three-part series on art & science that hinges on the premise: art that people claim to be a product of science should be accompanied by evidence that justifies that claim.

Adhering to procedure

We’ve all seen it before—a sea anemone vase, a charcoal drawing of cell walls, a work of art that claims to be science but is in fact just a work of art inspired by science.

The Canadian blog “Art the Science”  reinforces the common misconception that art can be science without resulting from science in action. Each of their posts that features an interview with a creator opens with the same question: “Which came first in your life, the science or the art?” The responses reveal that plenty of artists who engage with science or work under its guise do so thematically but not necessarily methodologically. The likes of “Art the Science” prompt us to look for science in subject matter but not to question procedure.

Another “Art the Science” interview question discloses a second underlying assumption regarding the way science permeates art (even though the blog’s title suggests it will disclose the reverse). “Which materials do you use to create your artworks?” communicates that science can be found in media, or tools and technology. As a case in point, the “Art the Science” blog unintentionally shines light on some ways we’re tempted to settle for thematic and technological fragments of science in art, without the expectation of finding science itself.

What we need to remind ourselves is like every other form of knowledge, science is constructed through particular procedures. The next post in this series will address how science can be properly employed to create art, but, for now, let’s dismantle the very enticing trap of equating science with technology.

Calling technology into question

“Art the Science” is not an isolated example of editorial that potentially leaves readers feeling as though they’ve just learned about some great new piece of ‘scientific art.’ Take for instance, the article “7 Ways Technology is Changing How Art is Made,” published on Smithsonian.com in 2014. Here is an example it showcases:

Like the other six examples, this work gives off an air of being very scientific; it incorporates environmental stimuli, gadgetry, and data. These three things can, of course, be understood in scientific terms. But so can all other objects or media that we find incorporated into art. Paint can be understood in the scientific terms of chemistry, and yet this does not make the paint an indicator of science, as defined above. Thus, we should not fall victim to embracing red herrings which are dressed up like science.

All art created by means of technology can be said to reflect on or have been inspired by science. That doesn’t mean that it was necessarily derived from the scientific method. When Morozov shares the documentation of the prototypes that led to this working device and formulates a statement regarding what it makes evident about pollution in Moscow, then we can call his project both art and science with conviction.

A more classic example of this art/science/technology quandary can be found in the medium of photography. When it was invented in the mid-nineteenth century, it was a technological wonder—artistically and scientifically.

Now, photography is an agreed-upon art form. And certainly, there is a science behind how the camera captures an image, but only a portion of photographs serve to interpret science in action.

Therefore, employing technology as a tool is not the same as using science as a method.

This distinction is wonderfully illustrated by the documentary film Tim’s Vermeer, which follows the inventor Tim Jenison’s efforts to prove that the photographic quality of the 17th-century Dutch painter’s masterpieces could be attributed to Vermeer having mechanical help.

Even if the conclusion that Jenison draws in the film is correct (and it would seem that it is), calling Vermeer’s paintings ‘scientific art’ wouldn’t be accurate according to the criterion of communicating documented methodology. It’s haphazard to use the word science to describe the effect of technology upon art.

Science is a mode of inquiry

In Tim’s Vermeer, Jenison follows the scientific method when he replicates Vermeer’s approach. Jenison wonders how Vermeer was able to achieve such a photographic quality in his paintings. From reading David Hockney’s Secret Knowledge and Philip Steadman’s Vermeer’s Camera, he hypothesizes that Vermeer used a mirror to monitor parts of the picture. He then builds a prototype to test this theory. After he and Steadman produce impressive oil paintings of a vase using only the technique without any classical education in the fine arts, Jenison sets out to test whether he can reproduce one of Vermeer’s famous paintings using the same procedure. He recreates the physical scene with all its objects, and during the process of painting he is able to observe how the mirror produced some anomalies in Vermeer’s work that could only be attributed to its intervention. Analyzing the final painting, Jenison, Steadman, and Hockney all draw the same conclusion—Vermeer’s sleight of hand was aided by mirrors.

In light of this, we should begin to hold artists, curators, and critics accountable when they assert that artistic objects are scientific. Only what artists do—not what they create or what they use to create it—can be called science. Vermeer’s paintings are not scientific, but Jenison’s efforts to replicate them are.

In sum,

The steadfast way to argue that a work of art can be categorized as science is not to evoke subject matter or technology, but to take account of whether or not the artist used the scientific method. Through Tim’s Vermeer, we see that science is a mode of inquiry and an approach to the production of knowledge that is made explicit. Moreover, as a form of research and knowledge production, science is defined in large part by its stake in experimentation.

The discourse around art generally lacks any reference to the scientific method, so in the remaining posts of this series I will demonstrate what experimentation looks like for artists and what we should expect documentation to entail.

Public Art in the Age of Technological Mediation

In 2015 the city of Portland, Oregon celebrated the thirtieth birthday of its landmark statue Portlandia. But despite Portlandia’s iconic status in the city and in the world—as the second largest copper statue—there wasn’t much of a party. And you won’t find her image on postcards or souvenirs. Though she’s located in public space, Portlandia’s maker Raymond Kaskey retains commercial rights to the piece, and thus has veto power for duplication or re-creation of related images.

Reference guidelines are loosely obeyed and copyright infringements difficult to catch.

Art  has always had to address problems of attribution and authenticity. The Information Age has only complicated this. And the situation becomes even more muddled when the artistic object in question is presumed to be public. Yet, not all public art stakeholders would take Kaskey’s side in a debate over copyright infringement. There is, after all, a notable difference among ubiquitous documentation (Instagram photos and the like) and documentation for press, merchandising, and what I’d call records of fact. With that in mind, Portlandia raises some important legal and philosophical points for debate.

What are the merits of copyright vs the freedom of panorama?

According to “The Intellectual Property Wiki” on Gettyimages, “As a general rule, places that charge an admission fee or require a ticket for entry usually require special permission for commercial photography.” Following this, it would be reasonable to assume that no permission is required when that place is accessible without a fee or ticket. Not according to federal copyright law. 

U.S. copyright law gives the copyright holder—in our case, the artist—the exclusive right to produce derivative works, including photographs. The matter of photography is not black and white, however. Parts of the law automatically protect works that are fixed on or in ‘tangible mediums’—murals on walls, for example. Distinctions and exceptions are also made based on how photographers use the images, how much of a work they capture in the frame, and which creative elements of the original work they bring to their adaptation.

In Europe, the situation differs. The Freedom of Panorama, which was recently upheld by a vote in the European Parliament, maintains that the public has the unrestricted right to use photographs of public spaces showing copyrighted structures without infringing on the rights of the architect or visual artist. In the United States,freedom of panorama means you may freely take photos of permanent buildings and use them how you please, but you cannot do the same with photos of copyrighted artworks and sculptures. The EU’s Freedom of Panorama is not as important for protecting selfies as it is for allowing the uninhibited depiction of public spaces within educational records.

Where do we draw the line between works of art or records of fact?

Photographs can be characterized either way, but when we’re talking about a photo of a work of public art displayed on Wikipedia there’s little chance that the reader would assume that Wikipedia created whatever work of art they are depicting. In this case, a photograph of a work has been appropriated for public knowledge sharing. There’s certainly something commendable about that as far as public art is concerned—particularly when appropriate credit is given to the artists.

In many other cases, credit isn’t given where and when it’s due. Think of editorial content that cites the photographer of a work of public art but fails to mention the actual artists. In an odd turn of events, the appropriation is deemed more reputable than the original. Perhaps this is an unavoidable side effect of the technological mediation of objects in the form of images. Reference guidelines are loosely obeyed and copyright infringements difficult to catch.

Art housed in private institutions is privileged in this respect; they have more ownership over the information that contributes to art’s authenticity. Not only is a Van Gogh more clearly and reliably a Van Gogh in a museum, but as the International Network for the Conservation of Contemporary Art puts it: 

Artists often cooperate with conservators to integrate their works into the [museum] collection properly. This collaboration results in documentation that is specific to the installation and forms the basis for the display and management of the work.

When the artist collaborates in the process of documentation, that documentation becomes a work of art in and of itself. Whether public art should operate differently and concede ownership to public appropriation is a relevant question without a definitive answer.

What does ‘liveness’ have to do with public art documentation?

When we talk about the conservation of public art, we can be referring to its physical preservation but also to how it may or may not be possible to conserve its presence through technological mediation. By presence I mean the simultaneous physical presence of the artwork and the public in the same space and moment of time.

Professor of performance and technology, Steve Dixon, identifies two conflicting views in cultural studies concerning the photograph’s claim to preservation and liveness. On the one hand, there’s Walter Benjamin who argues that when an artwork is mechanically reproduced, its presence is diminished. Benjamin writes, “Even the most perfect reproduction of a work of art is lacking in one element: its presence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be” (Dixon 2007). On the other hand, there’s Roland Barthes who considers photography a means to making the reality of the past live again. He contends that “every photograph is a certificate of presence” (Dixon 2007); rather than being fabricated ‘copies’ of reality, they are authentications. Pics or it didn't happen.

I imagine Barthes’s point of view is appealing to conservationists and documentarians of temporary public artwork. After the work is uninstalled, we have no choice but to rely on multimedia documentation to get an idea of how it may have been experienced (see Christo & Jeanne Claude’s famous Gates). To Benjamin’s credit, though, participation or interactivity cannot be saved. When it’s re-presented, it becomes something else altogether.

Today, photography isn’t a standalone form. We have a multitude of methods to document interactivity. For all these methods may be worth, they’ll ultimately fall short of replicating the live event. Naturally, with this, the problem of ownership remains.

What, then, should we make of the technological mediation of public art?

Ubiquitous documentation, regardless of its original intent, represents an end to seeking permission. With this, there’s a renewed need for attribution to be given where it’s due and for public artists to consider how ‘public’ they want their art to be. Tools including Creative Commons & initiatives such as Open Source validate this as a pressing issue. If someone in another country wants to own a reproduction of a piece of public art that they’ve never seen in-person—to meet the original halfway, as Benjamin puts it in “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” (1970), why should an image of that work—or even the code and hardware used to make it—not be ‘public’ for them?

Maybe all modes of presence wherever the artwork and public meet and whether live or mediatized now need to be regarded on equal grounds. Where a commitment to access is concerned, we need policies which uphold the trend that art’s public and art’s reach has been extended beyond the physical and the now.

At New American Public Art, we don’t have an easy solution for this attribution quandary just yet. We seek a way to make public the process of making public art.  We could learn from our interdisciplinary colleagues: perhaps the answer lies somewhere in between the practical reference style of scientific papers and the completionist listing of film credits.