Video transcript: The Cultural Institute: What is Leeds Creative Labs?
Transcript for the video embedded on the Leeds Creative Labs spotlight page.
[Music playing.]
[Overhead views of the University of Leeds campus. Lorna Dougan, Professor of Physics, sits down in a large armchair and smiles into camera.]
Lorna says: The creative labs was a chance for us as scientists to connect with a creative professional. So it's a bit like a disruptive technology in the sense of having someone come in and challenge the norm that can create a paradigm shift for a research field.
[John Ladbury, Professor of Mechanist Biology and Dominic Gray, Head of Projects, Opera North, sit down at an outside table on campus.]
John says: When you put somebody outside their comfort zone and somebody has to think differently, I think you end up getting the best results.
Dominic says: Both the Cultural Institute and the team behind the Creative Labs do amazing work to make sure that those combinations that come together are the right ones.
[Chris Hassall, Associate Professor of Biology and Alison Smith, Freelance Artist, sit on a bench on campus.]
Chris says: I'm interested in how to communicate about the actual world. I can do that through numbers and data and scientific papers, but my big question was how can I try to communicate in a way that might engage people a little bit more?
Dominic says: The arts and the sciences are driven by a spirit of inquiry. What if? What happens if I try that? What happens if I explore that route?
John says: When you bring together those inquiring minds, and you think about what you can do together, you start to come up with things which are even more exciting.
Lorna says: They came with some really interesting questions that really challenged us and made us rethink some of the things that we were looking at with our research.
[Suzie Cross, Freelance Creative Producer, walks in front of the Roger Stevens pod and smiles into camera.]
Suzie says: What was really beautiful is it was a blank canvas. We didn't have any hard outcomes that we had to reach. What we had to do was see where our skills could benefit each other and bring value to the table.
Alison says: I'm a real advocate of the idea that everybody is creative and I think it's really nice for a project like this to enable people to channel that creativity into something.
Dominic says: There's no expectation of an outcome. It's up to you what you do.
John says: You're free to play and it's fantastic.
Chris says: It was more productive than I had ever anticipated as a result of that sort of approach.
Suzie says: I was paired with academics from the School of English. We started with something we both worked on. We looked at where there was overlap and synergy and then we created something new.
Alison says: We created a large light installation for light night in 2019.
Chris says: It's a series of flowers that a participant from the audience can visit as though they were a bee, and experience different soundscapes that are recorded from the natural world. It has sound it has light.
Alison says: It's quite an immersive piece but also has real scientific research within it.
Suzie says: The thing I’m most proud of is the mysterious bird in the moonlight book that we created. It's really an opportunity to engage young children at a time when we can really foster an appreciation for nature. That's a real treasure.
Chris says: Leeds Creative Labs is a wonderful example of trying to facilitate that inter and multi-disciplinary approach.
Dominic says: Going forward just like to see these partnerships kind of built into the DNA of what research is, whether that's scientific research or arts research.
Chris says: Ultimately, I suppose, with a view to completely transcending disciplines and looking at a problem in light of whatever approaches we can take in order to solve it.
John says: By having an open mind and by learning more about each other we can actually be better at what we do.
[An overhead view of the University of Leeds Campus. Text says: Leeds Creative Labs.]