Laurence’s visionary collaboration of art and science unveils the hidden complexities of Antarctic exploration while fostering empathy and environmental consciousness. Through experiential aesthetics and emotional resonance, her work transcends traditional scientific discourse, demystifying climate change’s impact on Antarctica. Laurence’s creations bridge understanding, nurture care, and amplify the urgency of preserving our fragile planet.
Which wall does your research break?
My work creates visibility of scientific explorations while evoking empathy and actions of care. As an artist, I have the freedom to speak. I am an independent voice and can reveal and translate material that often remains opaque in science. My work brings an experiential aesthetic, an emotional language, into the delivery of information about the climate emergency and our environment. This brings critical scientific work to the general public through art.
What inspired or motivated you to work on your current research or project?
Having recently been to the Antarctic and working with scientists there, I feel the need to make this extraordinary and fragile place comprehensible through art. Antarctica’s unraveling, through catastrophic climate change, needs to be demystified and brought to a broad audience. Antarctica’s future will determine our ways of being on the planet.
In what ways does society benefit from your research?
I am able to educate and create experiences about the fragility of our planet. These works that can be very emotional, can also nurture through aesthetics of beauty. My work focuses on the fragility of our nature and the potential for loss. Art can aid in empathy, and my work brings about care for our planet. For example, my hospital for the Great Barrier Reef, called Deep Breathing: Resuscitation for the Reef, exhibited at Muséum National D’historie Naturelle, the Australian Museum, and the Museum for Contemporary Art Sydney, was a wunderkammer based on scientific evidence, but it delivered an engaging visual theatrical aesthetic using film, painting, photographs, sculptural objects, laboratory glass, and museum specimens.