Art & Science: Friends?

Pada 10-12 Februari hari tu berlangsungnya Contemporary Music Festival di UoP ni. Ahli lab aku byk jg yg participated dlm event ni, mostly submitted their musical piece la kan, bar me. Tema festival tahun ini ialah ‘Re-Sounding Science’.

Actually aku agak enjoy dgn isi kandungan festival tahun ni. Dari segi talk nya pon byk membuka mata aku, or maybe tiap2 tahun pon dah mcm ni tp aku aje yg baru nak dpt paham ke, x tahu la aku.

Antara yg best ialah talk daripada Prof Miller ni psl ‘Creative Art, Creative Science’. Kita selalu automatically terpikir yg art and sciences ni x geng, x masuk. Kalo org tu cenderung kpd science, mmg hopeless la bab2 art. Kalo org tu minat art, sciences lingkup lah jawab nya. Sebenarnya bkn begitu. Beliau bgtau yg art and sciences ni should come together, hand-in-hand. Even Pablo Picasso pon derived ideas from sciences jgk.

Pada tahun 1904, Picasso si artis ni berpikir2 mcm mana nak break out of the norm, siap toying with the idea of fourth dimension lg. Pada tahun yg sama, Albert Einstein plak tgh bermati2an pikir psl time and simultaneity. Hinggalah pada tahun 1907, si Picasso the artist pon telah menggunakan the reduction of forms to geometry untuk menghasilkan karya terkini nya yg diberi nama ‘Demoiselles’. Bentuk lukisan begini adalag dipanggil Cubism, suatu teknik lukisan yg unique lg menggegarkan dunia, mashyur hingga ke hari ini. Cubism ni derived drpd idea non-Euclidean geometry and the fourth dimension, idea asal Henry Poincare yg diterbitkan dalam ‘La Science et l’hypothese’. Buku yg sama dirujuk extensively juga oleh Albert Eisntein sehinggalah beliau berjaya cracked the theory of relativity!



And it works the other way around jgk. Prof. Harry Kroto and his team telah menemui struktur bg a new form of carbon, yakni C60. Bkn senang nak dpt figure out struktur carbon baru ni. Mcm2 cara diaorg experimented. Sekian lama nya la team diorg duk pikir mcm mana la these unsaturated carbon-based molecules which were composed of hexagons and pentagons of carbon are joined together. Last2 dlm a moment of inspiration, Prof Kroto teringat satu work ni by seorg arkitek bernama Buckminster Fuller yang mempamerkan the geodesic dome structure ni yg Prof Kroto ni pernah tgk masa at the Architectural Expo’67 di Montreal, Canada. Masa tu Prof Kroto attended the expo sbb beliau bekerja sbg graphic designer sebelum ni (artistic side). It was exactly the same structure dgn carbon c60! (made of hexagons and pentagons together). Long story short, team diorg berjaya solve carbon C60 punya struktur, which is now referred as the fullerene structure in chemistry for carbons yg mempunyai struktur sebegini. Oh, and Prof. Kroto won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1996 wokeh? Hebat x hebat when we utilize science and art together.



Mencedok artikel Prof Miller drpd sini, conclusion nya begini:

"Picasso and Einstein believed that art and science are means for exploring worlds beyond perceptions, beyond appearances. Einstein's approach to space and time was not primarily mathematical. Notions of aesthetics were essential to his discovery in 1905 of relativity and a new representation for light, and then in 1907 of a means to widen relativity theory to include gravity. Nor were Picasso's studies of space totally artistic in the narrow sense of this term, as his interest in scientific developments reveals. Picasso's new aesthetic for the Demoiselles was the reduction of forms to geometry.

Instead of referring to an "interplay" between art and science, we must begin to speak of ideas that were developed in common by artists and scientists. The age-old quest of both art and science has been to seek new representations of phenomena beyond appearances. This effort becomes focused at the nascent moment of creativity, when boundaries dissolve between disciplines and notions of aesthetics became paramount. Coming to grips with this phenomenon requires delving into the nature of creative thinking."

Aku harap author asal dia x saman aku cut and paste di sini. Bkn niatku nak plagiat kan hasil tulisan beliau, but he has it wayyyy better than I can ever summarize. Dia ni la yg salah seorg yg bg talk dkt Neuro*Arts Conference hari tu. Kalo berminat nak baca buku dia, bole la order di sini ye.

Cuma agak gusar sket, sbb education system kita kat Msia ni at the time being seolahnya nak pisahkan dua bidang ni. I mean, di peringkat sekolah menengah lg dah pecah2 kan, aliran sains or sastera. Bkn setakat tu, stigma masyarakat kita ialah kalo budak nmpk ada potensi cerah sket aje MESTI push suruh buat science, biar la budak tu sbanrnya nak buat Social Sciences or Sastera sbb minat, terpaksa dikuburkan terus niat hati tu. Sedangkan kalo di UK ni, pengalaman masa aku di high school buat GCSE (O Level) dan A-Level, mmg bole gabung, nak amik Drama, Physics and German? Silakan…. Ada member tu amik English, IT, Psychology… ada jgk yg gabung Maths, Further Maths, Physical Education…. Semua bole…

Tp aku faham jgk la, kita negara membangun, belum lg negara maju, so focus negara adalah pada science and technology. I guess bila dah sampai jd negara maju nanti, baru la human resources pon cukup utk rakyat kita bebas memilih utk nak study apa pon. Sblm sampai peringkat tu, mmg terpaksa la selected aliran aje di utilize sepenuhnya utk membangunkan negara. Tp dikhuatiri pandangan ramai yg arts ni bidang pengajian second class. Salah begitu. Jangan lah pulak nanti sampai we fail to appreciate the need and beauty of art in life.

Ok itu sahaja utk hari ni. Aku selaku org Interdisciplinary (Computer Music), harap dpt menyampaikan dgn tone neutral. Of course, untung sekali kalo kita dapat mahir kan diri dlm dua2 bidang, tp kalo x dpt pon, galakkan anak2 utk mengambil bahagian dlm dua2 area. Utilize kan otak kiri dan kanan sepenuhnya. Org arts dan science jgn gaduh2 aaa…. Niat kita sama saja mencari ilmu kerana Allah. Semoga semua usaha kita diberkatinya….. Amin…