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This is the website for Festival of the Mind 2022

The 2022 festival has now passed, for the Festival of the Mind 2024 programme, please visit festivalofthemind.sheffield.ac.uk/2024. More info

Fungal Figures

Professor Katie Field, School of Biosciences, and artist Alex Ekins have explored links between people and fungi, the basis and endpoint of life on Earth. The result is a life-size wooden figure of the human form, seeded with fungi to grow out of the sculpture.

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The Biophilic Garden

Biophilia (‘Bio’ = living beings, ‘philia’ = Love for) is an ancient phenomenon going back to our time as Hunter-Gatherers, but only recently defined by Harvard biologist E. O. Wilson, as an ‘Innate and genetically determined affinity of human beings with the natural world’ (1984).

The ‘Biophilic Garden’ is an installation in a public space (the Winter Garden, Sheffield) which demonstrates these principles and enables visitors to reflect on their own relationship to the natural world, via 5 pathways to nature connection – senses, beauty, emotion, meaning and compassion.

The installation contains two areas representing a ‘Woodland’ and ‘Mountain’ archetype, containing plants typically associated with those habitats. These include tactile and fragrant plants that humans have adopted for sensory, medicinal or spiritual purposes. The planting is augmented through use of QR codes and image markers which visitors can use to trigger additional information via their own mobile phones.

Soundscape in Winter Garden, bbc.co.uk © 2022 BBC

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Zoomshock: How Will Working From Home Change our Cities?

Zoomshock is a dynamic animated video created by Humanstudio highlighting research by Dr Jesse Matheson, Department of Economics, into the societal effects of remote working. How will working from home change our cities?

The pandemic has had many implications for the UK and other countries. However, the profound impact of the pandemic on how, and where, we work could have far-reaching implications for the economy. Specifically, the amount of work done from home has increased from below 6% in 2019 to more than 25% in the first half of 2022. This translates into thousands of workers not going into their city centre office and not purchasing coffee, food and retail at the local businesses that serve daily commuters. In this research project we study how working from home has, and will continue to, reshape our cities and our local economies. 

This project received funding through the UKRI Economic and Social Research Council (grant number ES/V004913/1).

Links to related articles:

The Conversation “Five charts that reveal how remote working could change the UK

VoxEU “The geography of working from home and the implications for the service industry

Economic Observatory “Zoomshock: how is working from home affecting cities and suburbs?”

Links to academic work:

Remote working and the new geography of local service spending“, (2022) G. De Fraja, J. Matheson, P. Mizen, J. Rockey, and S. Taneja. Centre for Economic Policy Research, Discussion Paper 17431. 

Covid reallocation of spending: The effect of remote working on the retail and hospitality sector“, (2021) G. De Fraja, J. Matheson, P. Mizen, J. Rockey, S. Taneja, and G. Thwaites. Sheffield Economics Research Paper Series, number 2021006. “Zoomshock: The geography and local labour market consequences of working from home”, (2021) G. De Fraja, J. Matheson and J. Rockey. Covid Economics: Vetted and Real-Time Papers. 64, 1-41.

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Yes, it’s Plastic, but…

Plastics and environmentalism are bound up in a confusing mixture of contradicting thoughts, facts, beliefs and desires. This interactive installation, created by artist Lynne Chapman in collaboration with Professor Joanna Gavins, Dr Stefanie Hills, and Dr Emma Franklin, School of English, explores this issue. People can interact with the piece and consider conflicting views on plastic packaging, reuse and what it means to be environmentally friendly.

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The ‘Many Happy Returns’ Project is funded by the Smart Sustainable Plastics Packaging Challenge (SSPP), delivered via the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC).

Unseen Forms: Water Music Suite

A sound installation exploring the dynamics of our vital water supply networks. How these networks work and are managed remains an engineering challenge.

Our modern civilisation relies heavily on the instant reliable availability of potable water.  Our water supplies are transported to us, as consumers, through buried infrastructure, hidden from our view and, until failures, our consciousness. Engineers face the challenge of operating and maintaining these systems with imperfect information, with only limited control to influence the water consumers received.

In the Unseen Forms exhibition users are able to explore a water network using a limited set of senses and are challenged to maintain control of the complex system based on an ever evolving audio feedback landscape.

Audio landscape composed and developed by Yard Nule working with Dr Richard Collins, Senior Lecturer in Water Engineering.

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The project also draws on research from:

  • Managing Background Leakage: OFWAT Water Innovations Challenge, Dwr Cymru Welsh Water
  • TWENTY65 Tailored Water Solutions for Positive Impact
  • Probabilistic Transient Propagation

Collaborators

Interactive Visualization Software for Flood Simulations

A collaboration between Dr Mohammad Kazem Sharifian, Department of Civil and Structural Engineering, and Professor Paul Richmond, Department of Computer Science, exploring real-world flood modelling. The resulting interactive software shows 2D and 3D realistic animations of floods. Users can select different fields such as flood maps, damage to buildings, hydrographs and interact to change viewing angles.

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The Reaction-ator: Exploring Real-time Responses to Speech

What do you think about what you hear? What do you feel? What stands out when you listen to voices? Dr Chris Montgomery, School of English, has been researching the hidden understanding of language. Take a spin on the one arm bandit designed by Joi Polloi and test your reactions to language.

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Plastic: A Cheap Luxury?

Is plastic rubbish? Despite its reputation, plastics have a number of valuable properties that make them instrumental in day-to-day life. The Many Happy Returns project team, and Gina Allen, artist, have created a mixed media exhibition that questions our view of plastic. Is it a mere waste material or can new relationships with plastic lead to more beneficial environmental outcomes?

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With Support From

  • Maryam Hoseini
  • Clare Faulkner
  • Stefanie Hills
  • Sarah Greenwood
  • Harriet Baird
  • Saima Eman
  • Paul Mattinson
  • The Many Happy Returns project team

Many Happy Returns is a research project funded by the Smart Sustainable Plastics Packaging Challenge (SSPP), delivered via the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC).

Ownership and the Price of Empire

This immersive, interactive display encourages you to engage with debates and dialogue around the repatriation of ‘stolen’ museum objects implicated by Britain’s imperial past. Participate in processes of decolonisation and feel first-hand its implications by considering how we transform our museums for the twenty-first century.

As an immersive piece, you will get the chance to hold an significant object in your hands! You take it on a journey to discover more about it’s past, including where it comes from, how it got to be where it is today, and what might happen to it in the future. This includes the role that technology may play. It seeks to make you think and play an active, understanding, role in the debate around decolonising museums.

Read more about the project on the History Matters website.

Additional Resources

‘Gandhara Connections’ at the University of Oxford – for more information on Gandharan art: https://www.carc.ox.ac.uk/GandharaConnections/

The Gandhara School at the British Museum – for an overview of the 766 objects in that collection: https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/term/x23061

The Unfiltered History Tour of the British Museum – to ‘hear stories of disputed artefacts, as told by people from their homelands’: https://theunfilteredhistorytour.com/ 

‘Decolonising Museums’ – for more information from the Museums Associations on their initiatives: https://www.museumsassociation.org/campaigns/decolonising-museums/#Sheffield Museums – for more information on our partner institution: https://www.museums-sheffield.org.uk/about/

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Our thanks too to Dr Neha Vermani, University of Sheffield.

Partners

Sheffield Museums Trust

Our special thanks to:

Sian Brown, Head of Collections

Martha Jasko-Lawrence, Curator of Archaeology

Elizabeth Lindley, Curatorial Assistant – Visual Art

Support

We are grateful to Arts and Humanities Knowledge Exchange for facilitating additional funding from the Higher Education Innovation Fund.

Over the Hill, Under the Covers?

What do you think will happen to your sex life as you get older? Sexuality is a ‘central aspect of being human throughout life’, according to the World Health Organization, so why is it that we tend not to think of older adults as sexual? In this immersive experience we explore sexuality through an age-related lens, and invite you to think about the ways that social attitudes can influence how we understand and experience sexuality and intimate relationships.

Over the hill, under the covers? was designed to raise awareness of the importance of sexuality in people’s lives as they get older and the discrimination people can face due to ageism and other intersecting inequalities. It was also designed to draw attention to the Sexual Rights Charter for Older Adults. The Charter aims to ensure that people are treated with dignity and respect as they get older when it comes to their sexuality. It’s about inclusivity, human rights, and creating an age-friendly society.

Find out more about the Sexual Rights Charter

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With Support From

Materials Matter: Sustainability for a Cleaner Planet

Everything we use is made of materials, selected for their ability to do a job. Each selection will have an environmental impact, either positive or negative, from when they are extracted, processed, used, recycled to how they are disposed of. Based on research from the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Stephen Birch and Dr Julian Dean show 5 key areas through a computer-generated interactive experience by designers Human studio, it reveals how new sustainable materials and processes are set to make a positive difference to our world.

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Material Mourning

A creative collaboration between artists Joanna Whittle and Dr Jane Wildgoose, and Dr Lizzy Craig-Atkins, Department of Archaeology. New paintings and ceramic artefacts explore themes of funerary practices and material culture.

This research will expand elements of Joanna’s current practice, enriching it with a deeper knowledge of the underlying themes of ritual and its residue in the landscape. From discussions and exploration of landscapes, sites, archaeological texts and associated artefacts Joanna will explore how they reflect our place in the landscape through how we choose to mourn, memorialise and remember.

As part of this project Joanna has also had the opportunity to collaborate with Dr Jane Wildgoose, founder and Keeper of The Wildgoose Memorial Library, London, who will also be showing a piece from her ‘Lost But Not Forgotten’ research project: in which she reflects on the disruption of the relationship between ritual, human remains and landscape, concerning contested human remains in museum collections. 

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Life Game

Cutting-edge conservation research blends with art and design to create two exciting, contrasting responses to mass extinction. Artist Paul Evans has been working in collaboration with Professor David Edwards and his team at the Department of Biosciences, developing and producing LIFE GAME. This engaging, playable artwork will involve participants in a high stakes contest to save life on Earth. Evans has also been working with filmmaker Jon Harrison to produce a series of emotional film shorts featuring five ‘future eulogies’ for endangered species, written and performed by conservation scientists from Professor Edwards’ research group.

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Kunststoff: Plastic – The Material of Art

A 3D sculpture created by artist Anthony Bennett, inspired by research by Professor Anthony Ryan, Department of Chemistry and Emily Green, University Heritage Collections Manager, responding to issues of repurposing redundant plastic materials.

More about the project

Kunststoff is a long term project initiated by Professor Tony Ryan and Emily Green, responding to issues surrounding the repurposing of redundant PVC generated during the conservation of the artwork ‘Graduation’ by artist Diana Springall, originally installed at The Weston Park Library in 1988. In order to deal with these issues, Tony approached artist Anthony Bennett, with the hope that a collaboration could be achieved, to create ‘a circularity of art’, to contextualise the current dilemmas which envelope the human race’s use and misuse of Plastics.

Professor Ryan has proposed neoteric research to investigate possibilities for the chemical recycling of PVC. He has coined the term ‘Orphan’ plastics to allegorize the necessity for this revolutionary research, in his search for appropriate funding.

Anthony was inspired having heard Tony relating his ‘Hope’ for ‘Orphan’ plastics, a enthusiastic aspiration for a future potential transformation. ‘Fostering’, ‘Caring’, ‘Taking responsibility for’ something  which, to most people, including many artists, see as ‘Bad’, but to a chemist is seen as an amazing store of energy and chemicals, if only we knew how this is to be

The concept relates to ‘Guardianship’ and ‘Transformation’. A ‘Chrysalis’. When a young person becomes an ‘undergraduate’, and merges into a Campus, they embark on a transformative process. The University looks after them during their transfigurative experience, encapsulates them, protects them as they metamorphose, in the hope that they will ‘Graduate’, and emerge, prepared, ready to take control of their futures. To ‘Fly’ perhaps.

With the assistance of undergraduate Will Songsheng Wu, who has access to tools at the University’s iForge facility, Anthony will create a large ‘Chrysalis’ from the PVC. The shell will be created from thermoformed pieces of PVC, laser cut shapes and letters, using the ‘waste’ from the conservation process of the Library artwork. Anthony will create a ‘plug’ from polystyrene, with sculptor Theo Wickenden, which itself is recyclable, around which the ‘shell’ of the Chrysalis will be formed. The plug form is also used to create 3d digital models, via scanning the analogue carving, assisted by Matt Willoughby, and 3d digital sculpting by Tom Bennett. The cut PVC pieces, inspired by shapes from the artwork frieze, words of hope, and equations instrumental in the complex chemistry, will be glued and ’stitched’ together, referencing the stitching, appliqué, embroidery, of the original artwork. The glue is made from waste PVC, and was developed by Rosanna Hood, a Chemistry undergraduate working with PhD student Courtney Thompson. The Giant Chrysalis artwork, will then be hung on display until a time when the forthcoming research at the University can be applied to the PVC of the chrysalis, when it may be recycled, and given a new chemistry, and hence a new existence.

Its first installation is in Futurecade, as part of Festival Of The Mind 2022, then it will be re- installed at the Weston Bank Library, adjacent to the newly conserved artwork frieze. 

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  • Anthony Bennett, Sculptor
  • Theo Wickenden, sculpture assistance
  • Matt Willoughby and Tom Bennett, digital scanning and 3D digital sculpt
  • Rosanna Hood assisted by Courtney Thompson, PVC Glue research
  • Will Songsheng Wu, CAD work and waterjet cutting

Imagining Technologies for Disability Futures

Led by Dr Michael Szollosy, Department of Computer Science, a group of engineers and designers have created a hands-on exhibit of cutting-edge robotics, prosthetics and assistive technologies. Designed to reimagine the future around issues of disability and technology, the exhibit can be experienced remotely through an application using telepresence robotics.

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Dr Michael Szollosy, Department of Computer Science

Collaborators

Imagining Technologies for Disability Futures project

Can We Fly-less?

An immersive visual-audio exhibition that can help you to consider, reflect upon, and respond to your and others’ attitudes to flying-less. There is great variety in the frequency and distances that people fly. If commercial aviation were a country, its carbon emissions are estimated to be equivalent to the sixth largest in the world.

The visual-audio presented on screen considers four different perspectives about flying-less. The four perspectives (‘Disparate’, ‘Intertwined’, ‘Interdependent’, and ‘Embedded’) are each depicted by a painting and sound scape which includes an indicative quote of what somebody might say who is associating with the perspective.

Once you have watched the video sound scape, either online or at the exhibition, we invite you to share your thoughts by filling out a short feedback form.

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Authentic Corpse

A collaboration between Professor Peter Jackson, Institute for Sustainable Foods, and artist Anthony Bennett based on research and interest in the cultural meanings of food. The installation using 4 film pieces is inspired by the parlour game, Exquisite Corpse, where a distorted body emerges from a series of separate drawings of head, body, legs and feet.

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  • Anthony Bennett, Sculptor
  • Lydia Bennett, Sculptural Installation Assistant
  • Tom Bennett, Film
  • John Tippetts, Fluid Mechanics Advisor
  • Thanks to Emilie Taylor and family for Exquisite drawings

With Support From

UKRI Strategic Priorities Fund

Institute for Sustainable Food

A Spaceship Inside the Ear

The Hearing Research Group developed a virtual reality experience to take the audience through a journey inside the ear. You will discover the sensory receptors important for hearing and see different scenarios that perturb the auditory organ causing hearing defects. Professor Walter Marcotti’s laboratory is investigating the mechanisms underpinning different types of hearing loss, to aid the development of therapeutic strategies such as gene therapy.

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With Support From

A Mirror of the Invisible: Shakespeare and Renaissance Science in the Modern World

Artworks themed on the concept of the mirror draw on research by Dr Tom Rutter, School of English, on Shakespeare and early modern science. The artworks by Gina Allen juxtapose Renaissance ideas about the universe, matter and the body with modern anxieties such as climate change, pollution and disease.

About the project

This project puts the science of Shakespeare’s time into dialogue with modern priorities and concerns. Early modern people sought answers to familiar scientific questions: what are the causes of events in the sky and on earth? What is the universe made of? Why do we get ill? Although the answers they found sometimes seem close to those of today, they were often underpinned by theories that have since been superseded — for example that the earth was at the centre of the cosmos, or that human health was influenced by the four humours. However, not only do these concepts remain striking, interesting and, at times, easy to relate to: they also offer a way of rethinking our own assumptions about the world and our place in it. How would Renaissance meteorologists have understood the climate emergency? Does classical atomism help us to think about plastics pollution? What measures might have been taken against Covid-19 in Shakespeare’s London?

This project uses questions like these as a stimulus to the creation of a three-part atwork by Gina Allen that draws both on early modern and on contemporary scientific concepts and images. It links these using the theme of the mirror, a common motif in the titles of early modern scientific texts (such as William Cunningham’s The Cosmographical Glasse, an image from which appears in the header on our web page). In doing so, it will tries to intervene in the more urgent problem of how to represent the invisible — be that a virus, microparticles, or the destruction of life on earth – in a way that might help to achieve behavioural change.

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Copyright

Header image is Atlas holding up the earth and heavens, from William Cunningham, The Cosmographical Glasse (London, 1559), STC 4863.5, page 254, image 063906, used with permission of the Folger Shakespeare Library

A Mirror It Does Seem

This project is a collaborative artistic response by contemporary artists Alison Churchill and Roanna Wells to the theme of the moon reflected on water as expressed in three premodern Japanese poems, integrating their individual practices to combine both moving light and the stillness of watercolours into a new work. It was inspired by Tom McAuley’s work on premodern Japanese poetry and poetic criticism.

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1000 Muses

A collaboration between Dr Nicola Nadeau and Luke Richardson from the School of Biosciences, with creative partners Daisy Chambers-Dubus and James Rogers. A large-scale hanging installation depicts butterfly wings across an altitudinal gradient in the Andes. The artwork is made up of photographs of individual butterfly specimens collected for a research project investigating the effects of temperature and altitude on butterfly populations in the tropics, giving insight into the research process and the intricate relationships between organisms and the environment.

Photo credit: Tien Nguyen

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Dr Nicola Nadeau, School of Biosciences

– Luke Richardson, School of Biosciences

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Daisy Chambers-Dubus, Photography

– James Rogers, Music