Socialising Science | Science Events at Dublin Fringe
With so many science & curiosity-themed events happening regularly across the country and abroad, we try to capture them on ‘Socialising Science’ with video and a few words. And if you have an event you’d like to include, email [email protected] with ‘Socialising Science’ in the Subject line.
Science In Art & Theatre
What I really love to see is when artists find ways of bringing science into their work. Especially on stage. Here are some theatre events happening this autumn that explore topical science in unique and interesting ways.
Tiger Fringe Festival: Override by Stacey Gregg, Project Arts Centre:
A few blogposts back I told you about this science theatre happening at Dublin Fringe theatre in Project Arts Centre from Sept 9th -17th. White Labels’ Override is an unsettlingly funny and bitter love letter to the future. I went along to rehearsals last week and found out a little more from director, Sophie Motley:
Tiger Fringe Festival: Mimes in Time, Science Gallery Dublin
In the future, mimes are no longer physical theatre practitioners and have become the sole operators of the world’s time machines. Two brave mimes –– who don’t really like each other –– will travel everywhere and everywhen in a desperate attempt to find meaning in an infinite existence. But it’s also mostly jokes about time travel. Dreamgun presents Mimes in Time at Science Gallery from Sept 13-17th at 6pm and 7.30pm
Further details about Override and Mimes in Time including booking are all on the Tiger Dublin Fringe website.
Dublin Theatre Festival: Guerrilla, Project Arts Centre
Personally, I’m excited to go see Guerrila, presented by El Conde de Torrefiel, one of the most exciting and provocative theatre companies to emerge from Spain in recent years. Guerrilla presents the confused and contradictory inner universe of a group of people that inhabit the same moment in time, move through the streets of the same city, share the collective conciousness of the same continent, and are affected to a greater or lesser degree by the same consequences. Even so, they don’t know how to face a world that has changed too much since the beginning of the 20th century and that is in constant need of new rules, symbols, and tools for its interpretation. The show runs at Project Arts Centre from Sept 30th-Oct 2nd but with just 3 performances of Guerrilla, booking is highly recommended. Further details on the Dublin Theatre Festival site.
Review | Edinburgh Fringe 2016:
Alexander Kelly’s Third Angel brought 600 people to Summerhall theatre as part of Edinburgh Fringe. 600 People is based on a series of conversations Alexander had with astrophysicist Dr Simon Goodwin back in 2006, posing the question “are we alone in the universe?”. Delivered in a spoken word format, the show was very well received at Edinburgh, obtaining 4 stars. Finishing August 27th, we can only hope that Ireland might invite 600 people to our science festival circuit in 2017.
Hannah Nicklin wrote a show about endurance sports and why she needed to swim 2.4 miles, cycle 112 miles and then complete a marathon. Entitled Equations for a Moving Body, the show interweaved personal memoir with the physiology of endurance sports -when our brains tell our bodies to stop and the psychology of continuing. Described as ‘highly entertaining as well as educational’ this show was also presented recently at Edinburgh Fringe and ran until August 27th, also at Summerhall venue.
The multi-award winning Ontroered Goed presented World without Us at Edinburgh Fringe. This show explored a post-apocalyptic planet, in monologue format frequently in complete darkness, a sequence of verbal articulations of what that world might look like, literally without us. Taking the idea to its full conclusion, which is typical of this Belgian company, they explore scenarios of how much better off and how much worse off things might be without human intervention and then that none of it will matter since there will be no human consciousness. Check out the trailer video.
Other Events In September
Late Make: Microscopes- Here’s a late night workshop as part of Science Gallery Dublin’s Late Make series of events on September 8th from 6pm-7.30pm
In this third instalment of LATE MAKE the science gallery looks through the lens of our microscopes, but first, we’re going to make them. Join them as they take apart old webcams and use them to zoom in on the world around us. They will have a range of recycled materials on hand to help create your microscope, and you can choose to build a device that will display images on your computer, or one that attaches to your smartphone.
‘A Simple Response to an Elemental Message’ new art piece by Paul Quast
Send your personal message into Space with a new project from Irish artist Paul Quast in collaboration with European Space Agency, UK Astronomy Technology Centre, University of Edinburgh and others. I came across this really interesting European multilingual Space project and thought you might like to get involved. Paul Quast is reaching out to the public and asking them to answer the following question: ‘How will our present environmental interactions shape the future?’ If you’re interested in contributing, go to his website on www.asimpleresponse.org before September 16th.
Meet the curators of Humans Need Not Apply
Thursday 8th of September you can meet the curators of the next Science Gallery Exhibition Humans Need Not Apply. This is a unique opportunity to meet the people behind the exhibition and give feed back on the themes and topics that will shape the show. It will cover the good, the bad, and the ugly of artificial intelligence… think Tesla, Facebook bots, and Roomba-poopocalypse. We’ll ask questions like can robots create art, and if a computer makes it, can it be culture?
This is free but register your attendance on the Science Gallery Website.
CONTACT US ABOUT YOUR SCIENCE/CURIOUS EVENT
We do our best to cover as many national science events as we can in this column, so if you have an event coming up, email [email protected] with ‘Socialising Science’ in the Subject line and we’ll include it in the next column.
Main Image: Override, Tiger Dublin Fringe Festival (Credit: Kobas Laksa 2016).
