PolARTS (2/3): The glacier

Kaldi Moss, multidisciplinary artist from India and former resident at Khoj, shares highlights from past and current projects. The artist shows creative practices around spatial sound, interactive installations and experimental concerts that go beyond the conventional boundaries of art and science.

Pooja Sood, Director of Khoj, a contemporary arts organisation in New Delhi and Akshay Pathak, former Head of Pro Helvetia New Delhi, give insights into the region’s art scene and into cultural exchange and artistic collaboration between South Asia and Switzerland.

Indian artist Rohini Devasher, who took part in the Connect India Residency at CERN, talks about her fascination for science and how she aims to apply scientific methodology to her artistic practice.

The scientists Martina Peter (CH) and Patricia Silva Flores (CHI) and the artists Jorgge Menna Barreto (BRA) and Maya Minder (CH) recall their experiences during a joint field trip to the Brazilian Amazon as part of ‘Fungi Cosmology’, a project bringing together science and arts professionals from Brazil, Chile, and Switzerland.

After the joint field trip to the Brazilian Amazon, the artists, scientists and curators look back on the collaboration, reflecting its lasting impact on their practices and discussing intentions and expectations for the upcoming field trips to Chilean Patagonia and the Swiss Alps.

The curators Lilian Fraiji (BRA), María Luisa Murillo (CHI), and Irène Hediger (CH) talk about their motivation to bring artists and scientists together, as well as their aim to create spaces within ‘Fungi Cosmology’ where experts with diverse backgrounds and from different disciplines can enter into dialogue.

Seraina Rohrer (former Head of Innovation & Society at Pro Helvetia) and Danièle Rod (Executive Director, Swiss Polar Institute), the initiators of PolARTS, recall why they initiated the programme and discuss what makes an art-science collaboration fruitful.

During a hike on site in Val d’Hérens (CH), where a scientific team installed their camp for several weeks, artist Maëlle Cornut and Dr Gianalberto Losapio discuss their field work from a scientific and artistic perspective while witnessing the melting of the Mont Miné glacier.

Maëlle Cornut (visual artist) and Dr Gianalberto Losapio (environmental scientist) explain their motivation to collaborate at the intersection of arts and science within the PolARTS programme. Also, they talk about their upcoming joint field trips to the Ferpècle and Mont Miné glaciers in the Swiss Alps.

In this episode, the AATB collective and senior researcher Hannes Mayer explore in a first-time meeting the concept of non-industrial robotics as well as their common ambitions for a successful future collaboration.