Art or Science?
They seem like opposites, one driven by data and the other by emotion. Have we bridged art and science? Both are inquisitive with a fearless approach to the
unknown.
Susanna Wong, External Collaborator at CERN, SIAE
Composer and Art Director of POP Science Poetry Production says, “Opera needs to be reinvented, because if it does not change, it slowly
disappears”. An opera performance is an extraordinary production using sight, hearing, imagination and sensibility
of the audience where all human passions are at work. This art
form needs a fresh perspective joining all the components and blending their
expressiveness in a effort to understand, or should I say understand better,
the world and how it works.
The multicultural
journey
Susanna was
born in Ecuador, of Chinese origin, a naturalized Italian citizen, living in
Geneva. Susanna’s multi-cultural background and natural passion for
communication, music, dance, science and literature paved the way for
curiosity. Her journey began in 2006 when she started mixing science and the
arts together, developing POP Science poetry, an out-reach program of CERN
funded by the European Union. An initiative that brought poets together with
physicists to help share their fascination of science through poetry.
This
project proved to be a success, which inspired her to think out of bounds. With her passion for the arts, and the
intense feeling that the latest discoveries of science are meaningful
only if people are aware of them and the research involved. Susanna was challenged, how can she make the connection?
Susanna’s
inspiration stems back to her early adult years when she felt inspired by
reading about the discoveries that were changing the world. She had a feeling
of intrigue that scientists were grasping the change.She
recognized it was not easy for scientists and researchers in the past, as they
were considered absurd when they first introduced their findings to the world,
but later found they changed humanity for the better.
Despite its
unquestionable importance, we must recognize that science does not always lend
itself to uncomplicated explanation. Facts are questioned, in favour of emotion
and gut feeling. What if we could explain
these findings in a way that everyone could understand and at the same time
reintroduce an old art form that represents the clearest embodiment of music, orchestration, elaborate performances, and grand stories?
Sounds of
science
The OPERA Project
- a mix of art and science to create a modern opera and a powerful channel to reflect and tell a story. Susanna’s vision is to realize a creative development
with collaboration of artists, authors, musicians, actors, directors and
choreographers to produce a production that will make opera come alive again in
a most unusual way.
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Preserving the Opera
Science applauds
the beauty of their concepts and equations. On the other hand, as humans we are
intensely visual creatures. It will be extraordinary to use art to translate those
concepts and equations into forms that are visual, and that wide audience can admire and enjoy.The production of
Opera has diminished, mainly for the appearance of new forms of entertainment.
“These rarely reflect the new vision of the
world”, says Susanna Wong.
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| Image source Morguefile |
The Opera project will be a collaboration with NASA, LIGO and IdeaSquare, CERN and International Opera Award in Italy.
As of now, this project is in the early stages of development.Subscribe to our blog and follow us on Twitter or Facebook while science through arts will revive the Opera and its heritage.
Interested to know more? Or, to help realize this project, contact us at opera@scimpulse.org
Interested to know more? Or, to help realize this project, contact us at opera@scimpulse.org