Art Initiatives
The Creative Laboratory For the Exploration of Medical Technology
In this interactive installation by designers Amos Peled and Job Sante, visitors are given a unique opportunity to explore the relationship between their bodies and technology in a creative way. The installation provides the tools to experience the body from the inside: listen to the sound of your ribcage or abdomen, and discover how different they sound. Through this, the installation raises questions about the role of medical technology in shaping our body image. Visitors are invited to experiment with this technology and document their own experience. As a keepsake, you can take home a printed version of your findings.
Betweter Festival
At the Betweter Festival, this installation was presented as a creative dialogue between technology and the body. Like other projects at the festival, where art, science, and the public converge, there was ample room for reflection and interaction. Visitors had the chance to try the installation and share their experiences directly with the creators, sparking inspiring conversations about the future of technology in personal and medical contexts.
Musical transformations
Two students from the Utrecht School of the Arts have created musical renditions of patient stories from the Psychiatry Story Bank for the Betweter Festival and The New Utrecht School. The final product could recently be heard at the festival, where scientists, artists and visitors come together.
Betweter Festival
Transforming patient stories into a piece of music. That is not without struggle. Artist Noah chose a story and wrote down all of her associations while reading. Then she gave it more body by creating a metre and rhyme. Because of the complete artistic freedom the students were given, she could give her creativity free rein. According to artist Madelief, this was an essential part of the process: ''It is important to say yes to ideas. You'll figure out later if they're actually good or useful."
The final result was musically showcased during the Betweter Festival. Passers-by could listen to the songs with headphones and directly tell the makers what the music evoked in them. The assignment has given Noah a lot of inspiration for the future: "For example, I think it would be interesting to set up something for people with dementia. There you can see that music, unlike text, can really linger and have an effect on someone."
Learning from Children's Stories
The Children's Story Bank at the Wilhelmina Children's Hospital, www.kinderverhalenbankwkz.nl, is a collection of personal stories from children and adolescents about how they navigate daily life with a (chronic) illness or disability. Storytellers describe how they experience diagnosis and treatment, the challenges they face, and where they find their sources of resilience. The website aims to provide recognition, inspiration, and support for the storytellers themselves, their families and friends, and other young patients reading these narratives.
The original, pseudonymized transcripts of these stories have been archived for scientific research and can be used to deepen understanding and knowledge in pediatric education for medical students. All of this aims to contribute to the improvement of healthcare quality.
Collaborating with an Artist
The WKZ Children's Story Bank believes in the power of the arts and aims to creatively represent the participants' stories. Presenting a story as a piece of art can open up new perspectives and insights. The WKZ Children's Story Bank works with storytellers and their parents to determine how and to what extent they can collaborate to create an artistic expression. The first pilot project has launched, marking the start of a long-term collaboration with a dedicated group of artists and students.
I Art My Science
I Art My Science is an artistic initiative by the Graduate School of Life Sciences at Utrecht University and the University Medical Center Utrecht.
I Art My Science encourages reflection on the mysteries encountered in daily scientific work. Whether in life or research, some questions remain beautifully unresolved. Through mediums like painting, sculpture, photography, music, and poetry, I Art My Science invites you to express the complexities of science through art. While we’ve made great strides in understanding our world, even more awaits discovery. In the space between knowledge and curiosity, art and science intersect, offering new perspectives on the mysteries we aim to unravel.
Explore recent exhibitions on the I Art My Science website.
Performing Working
The artistic research project Performing Working examined on the one hand the hidden performativity of work situations such as a hospital - the emotional, affective performance expected of healthcare staff to fulfill the many different roles that the work requires - and equally of the non-staff: the work that involved in fulfilling the role of patient. On the other hand, Performing Working looked at the many facets of the work that comes with (performance) art, and aimed to describe the - often invisible - work of (performance) artists and art workers, and the many roles that they too have to assume in order to work in the complex field, to find out what it takes to do this work, and what can make this work more sustainable.