Science and innovation type museums are in many large cities around the globe. Dublin, Ireland has the Science Gallery as a fantastic place for science exploration based in art and expression. There are Science Galleries in many cities, London, Melbourne and Venice. The The Science Gallery is unique in that it has an emphasis on the creative, art exploration for science topics. It’s not just a museum filled with and exhibit on computers for example, it’s exploding the computer into an art form or message. Science is open for debate here. I really love hands on or in your face experiences and I am looking forward to this one. I recently contacted Niamh O’Doherty at the Science Gallery to as a few questions about what they do there.
Hours: Please note that this is a gallery type setup. If they are in between shows, there will be down time for prep. Contact the galleries’ website to see if they have a show running
How did your museum get its start, and how have you seen it grow in the last five years?
Back in 2008, a car park in a forgotten corner of Trinity College Dublin was transformed into a living experiment called Science Gallery Dublin. Through a cutting-edge programme that ignites creativity and discovery where science and art collide, Science Gallery Dublin is a nonprofit that encourages young people to learn through their interests. Since its opening, over 2.5 million visitors to the gallery have experienced more than 38 unique exhibitions, ranging from living art experiments to materials science and from the future of the human race to the future of play. Science Gallery Dublin develops an ever-changing programme of exhibitions and events fuelled by the expertise of scientists, researchers, students, artists, designers, inventors, creative thinkers and entrepreneurs. The focus is on providing programmes and experiences that allow visitors to participate and facilitate social connections, always providing an element of surprise.
Has there been anything surprising that happened that you just ran with in an opportunity to create an exhibit?
We’re a living lab, so occasionally experiments do misbehave. Memorably, last year during Field Test, we had to shut down one of the experiments because of a blood-sucking fungus – here’s more info about that on our blog. We also host reactive events and talks based on big topics in the news, from AI to politics.
What is the planning process for creating new exhibits? Do you have any behind the scenes video or articles that future visitors can look at?
We work with a selection of guest curators on each exhibition – they could come from very diverse backgrounds in academics, business and the arts. We also host videos describing the themes of our exhibitions on our YouTube channel here, and you can check out our blog here for some more background on how the exhibitions develop and progress.
It’s the 2017 season coming and what are your plans for exhibits this coming year?
Yes, we’ve got all the details about our 2017 programme online here. We’ve recently closed the open call for our SOUND CHECK summer exhibition, and we’ll be launching the open call for IN CASE OF EMERGENCY… very soon.
Do your exhibitions centre on the local only or do you have art and future or contemporary issues come into play occasionally?
We’re part of the Science Gallery International Network, so we do tour our exhibitions, and our open calls generally attract artists, makers, researchers and scientists from around the world – here’s a few global highlights from last year.