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WAVES of CHANGE ART EXHIBITION A showcase by artists to promote Ocean literacy
The Waves of Change project invites to participate in our art exhibition.
An innovative art exhibition exploring ocean literacy will premiere at Watershed Studios in Bushy Park, Galway, on 28 March, 2025, at 6 p.m. The exhibition will also be open to the public the following day from 11am onwards.
The exhibition is the culmination of the Waves of Change project, a research initiative that fosters ocean literacy through stakeholder engagement, while promoting sustainable development and circular economy values based on ocean literacy principles. Throughout 2024, Waves of Change issued a call for artists to collaborate with scientists, using art as a means to communicate scientific understanding of the ocean. The selected artists participated in an immersive residency at Watershed Studios, supported by the Waves of Change project. The initiative is funded by the Marine Institute and partnered with Galway Atlantaquaria.
The successful artists were part of an overnight research training cruise on board the R/V Tom Crean in Galway Bay, to experience life on a research vessel. During this experience the artists collected audio-visual materials to get an appreciation of how scientists collect various samples while at sea and see firsthand the often-unseen diversity of life within the oceans.
The six artists (Aisling Roche, JD Whitman, Enda Burke, Kat Austen, Amy Kramer and Róisín Clothier) are currently on their one-month art residence in Watershed Studios. Each artist has been chosen based on their exciting portfolio of works, often related to the Ocean. During their residency the artists will explore the Ocean literacy principles and collaborate to create a body of work that will be presented at an open art exhibition (March 28th and 29th), in Bushy Park, that we hope will both inform and inspire those attending.
On the art residence Dr João Frias said: “Having the opportunity to work closely with artists is a grateful experience, as their vision of the world and the Ocean is very different than the vision of an analytic scientific mind. I believe that this exhibition is trying to achieve, for lack of better words, the famous quote of the Japanese writer Ryūnosuke Akutagawa: ‘Individually, we are a drop. Together, we are an Ocean’.”
On the forthcoming exhibition Dr Róisin Nash said, “There is tremendous potential for Science Communication through the Arts to reach a wider audience and have a greater societal impact; a fascinating process to witness”. “Being on the fringes of what is essentially a ‘hot spot’ of artists in full flight, you cannot but be inspired”.
On the art residence, Grace O’Malley, founder of Watershed Studios said: “Observing the collaboration between artists and scientists throughout this project highlights the limitless creativity and innovation that emerge when diverse perspectives come together. This endeavour instils a sense of ‘blue hope’ in a world often overshadowed by ‘blue fear’”.
The Ocean literacy art exhibition premiere will take place in Watershed Studios, in Bushy Park, Galway, on March 28, 2025, from 6pm onwards, and will be available the following day throughout the day starting at 11am.
