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Visiting the Science Gallery, Dublin for New Scientist<\/em>, 14 April 2018\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n Had you $1800 to spend on footwear in 2012, you might have considered buying a pair of RayFish sneakers. Delivery would have taken a while because you were invited to design the patterned leather yourself. You would have then have had to wait while the company grew a pair of transgenic stingrays in their Thai aquaculture facility up to the age where their biocustomised skins could be harvested.<\/p>\n Alas, animal rights activists released the company\u2019s first batch of rays into the wild before harvesting could take place, and the company suspended trading. Scuba divers still regularly report sightings of fish sporting the unlikely colourations that were RayFish\u2019s signature.<\/p>\n RayFish was, you\u2019ll be pleased to hear, a con, perpetrated by three Dutch artists five years ago. It now features in\u00a0Fake<\/a>, the latest show at the\u00a0Science Gallery, Dublin<\/a>, an institution that sells itself as the place \u201cwhere art and science collide\u201d.<\/p>\n The word \u201ccollide\u201d is well chosen. \u201cWe\u2019re not experts on any one topic here,\u201d explains Ian Brunswick, the gallery\u2019s head of programming, \u201cand we\u2019re not here to heal any kind of \u2018rift\u2019 between science and art. When we develop a show, we start from a much simpler place, with an open call to artists, designers and scientists.\u201d They ask all the parties what they think of the new idea, and what can they show them. Scientists in particular, says Brunswick, often underestimate which elements of their work will captivate.<\/p>\n Founded under the auspices of Dublin\u2019s Trinity College, the\u00a0Science Gallery is becoming a global brand<\/a>\u00a0thanks to the support of founding partner\u00a0Google.org<\/a>. London gets a gallery later this year; Bangalore in 2019. The aim is to not to educate, but to inspire visitors to educate themselves.<\/p>\n Brunswick recalls how\u00a0climate change<\/a>, in particular, triggered this sea-change in the way public educators think about their role: \u201cI think many science shows have been operating a deficit model: they fill you up like an empty vessel, giving you enough facts so you agree with the scientists\u2019 approach. And it doesn\u2019t work.\u201d A better approach, Brunswick argues, is to give the audience an immediate, visceral experience of the subject of the show.<\/p>\n For example, in 2014 Dublin\u2019s Science Gallery called its\u00a0climate change show \u201cStrange Weather\u201d<\/a>, precisely to explore the fact that weather and climate change are different things, and that weather is the only phenomenon we experience directly on a daily basis. It got people to ask how they knew what they knew about the climate\u00a0\u2013 and what knowledge they might be missing.<\/p>\n Playfulness characterises the current show. Fakery, it seems, is bad, necessary, inevitable, natural, dangerous, creative, and delightful, all at once. There are fictional animals here preserved in jars besides real specimens: are they fake, or merely out of context? And you can (and should) visit the faux-food deli and try a caramelised whey product here from Norway that everyone calls cheese because what the devil else would you call it?<\/p>\n Then there\u2019s a genuine painting that became a fake when its unscrupulous owner manipulated the artist\u2019s signature. And the Chinese fake phones that are parodies you couldn\u2019t possibly mistake for the real thing: from Pikachu to cigarette packets. There\u2019s a machine here will let you manipulate your fake laugh until it sounds genuine.<\/p>\n Fake\u2019s contributing artists have left me with the distinct suspicion that the world I thought I knew is not the world.<\/p>\n Directly above RayFish\u2019s brightly patterned sneakers, on the upper floor of the gallery, I saw Barack Obama delivering\u00a0fictional speeches<\/a>. A work in progress by researchers from the University of Washington, Synthesizing Obama is a visual form of lip-synching in which audio files of Obama speaking are converted into realistic mouth shapes. These are then blended with video images of Obama\u2019s head as he delivers another speech entirely.<\/p>\n It\u2019s a topical piece, given today\u2019s accusatory politics, and a chilling one.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Visiting the Science Gallery, Dublin for New Scientist, 14 April 2018\u00a0 Had you $1800 to spend on footwear in 2012, you might have considered buying a pair of RayFish sneakers. Delivery would have taken a while because you were invited … Continue reading ![\"Freddie](\"https:\/\/d1o50x50snmhul.cloudfront.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/29151129\/2nd-pic-fake-at-science-gallery-at-trinity-college-dublin652-800x533.jpg\" "\\"\\"")
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