Artscience (Part 1): How do we define this weird thing?

Many luminaries of the European Renaissance toed the line between science and art. You're of course thinking about Leonardo Da Vinci right now, because of course. But "artscience" is hardly a thing of the past, and many scientists and artists now are following that same interdisciplinary approach. As a result, many people have been trying to define this weird concept, and in my estimation, many are failing (please see the resoundingly meh first sally in this realm, Artscience: Creativity in the Post-Google Generation by David Edwards. It was a nice try, but meh). So, I'm now going to try. Artscience: what the hell are you people talking about?

One of the biggest hurdles in defining artscience is that it's so incredibly broad. Are you talking about it as a field of academic research? Are you talking about sciencey art or artsy science? Are you talking about what makes art good? What? I'm going to start my definition by discussing the first question, artscience as a field of academic research. This field can be defined as the examination of the cognitive (and sensory) experience of producing and consuming art. There are a few labs out there researching this concept (like my favorite, the NeuroArts Lab at McMaster University), who are most likely busy all the time (if they can get the funding) because of the vast area that this field encompasses. To research artscience is to research: cognitive function, the evolutionary role of art, how different cultures define art, how we produce different types of art, how we consume different types of art, etc. Too many.

Now how about sciencey art and artsy science (and STEAM)? This is, again, super broad. We can talk about my friend who's an art restorer for the Smithsonian, whose tricky work involves sooooo much chemistry and scientific experimentation in order to avoid doing this:

We can talk about wildlife photographers developing robots to go where people can't go, we can talk about scientists developing new neuroimaging techniques, we can talk about Nikon's Small World competition, we can talk about artists like Guhapriya Ranganathan who produce art inspired by neural structures. Hell, we can even talk about Jackson Pollock. Again, it's so damn broad that we can talk about all of this stuff and get nowhere.

Now onto what makes art good, or appealing. Yes, it's subjective, and yes, it's hard to distill, but is it worth talking about? So we know some things from the realms of art history and sensory perception. We like art that falls under the rule of thirds, we like Escher's art because it plays on the quirks of our sensory system, we like art that makes us feel something. There are even those little quizzes with pictures that are supposed to tell you what kind of person you are based on which one you like the best. "Why do we like some art and not others?" is that "reach" question, much like "what is consciousness?" and once we get past answering the first two questions, maybe neuroimaging and behavioral studies are the answer. 

Don't get me wrong - as a cognitive scientist AND dance artist I love this kind of stuff and am willing to discuss it ad nauseum. But like the cognitive scientist I am, I really want us to truly define what we're looking at before we go any further. 

Stay tuned for the next part of this series, Artscience (part 2): Music.