How can science communication in the humanities, media art, and art-based research inspire and complement one another, and how can they work together synergistically? We explored this central question through an artistic collaboration between Michael Johansson (Sweden) and Andreas Siess (Germany/Austria) in an interactive exhibition presented in southern Sweden from 15 to 23 August 2026.
Swedish version
There is a Swedish version of this article available at our blog -> wanderingmachine.se
In the middle of the rural landscape of Skåne lies a remarkable and rather unusual konsthall: Vita Ladan (“White Barn”). At this venue, we presented works developed over the course of their six-year artistic collaboration in a comprehensive exhibition comprising artworks, renderings, sculptures, installations, machines, and virtual reality.
The exhibition also provided insight into processes of art-based research, seeking to make transparent modes of investigation and inquiry conducted through artistic means and methods. In this sense, the exhibition constituted both communication about art and communication through art.
The project began with earlier research into the ways in which “shadows” and “shadowlands” were employed as metaphors for imagination and creativity in German Romantic literature around 1800.1 For us, this provided a compelling motif and became the initial point of departure for our artistic investigations. While Romantic literature employed shadows as metaphors for cognitive and imaginative phenomena that resisted direct description, we sought to reinterpret these metaphors as forms of medial representation.
Translating a conceptual metaphor into a concrete representation (i.e. an artwork) is a non-trivial task. We therefore adopted an experimental and exploratory approach, developing numerous prototypes, simulations, and sketches in order to gain a better understanding of “the shadow” as a creative and artistic instrument.
In the exhibition, we attempted to make this laborious but also rewarding process visible through what might be described as a demystification of the visible. Rather than merely displaying finished artifacts, the exhibition sought to reveal the complex, frequently hidden, and not infrequently frustrating processes of research and artistic creation. Consequently, not only the resulting artworks became visible, but also the explorations, rejections, detours, and repetitions that preceded their final form.
Sketches, research materials, experimental setups, media translations, reference objects, and material samples were therefore presented not merely as preliminary stages in the production of art, but as aesthetic realities in their own right. We assume that such materials can embody forms of knowledge that the finished work itself cannot contain: insights that emerge precisely from the provisional, the abandoned, and the not-yet-resolved. The exhibition thus offered comparatively intimate insights into the genesis of the artworks by deliberately exposing the iterative loops, dead ends, and occasionally fruitful but often exhausting detours that constitute the conceptual space of artistic production.
The exhibition at Vita Ladan Konsthall consequently followed a hybrid conceptual approach. On the one hand, it aimed to communicate a humanities research project through the means of an art exhibition. On the other hand, it presented artistic works that were derived from, inspired by, or developed through prior academic research.
As the phenomenon of shadows formed a central motif throughout our work — something “emerging out of the shadows” — we wanted the exhibition itself to remain suggestive, indeterminate, and open. Rather than adopting a conventional science communication approach in which a predetermined message is transmitted to recipients, we deliberately pursued an artistic approach that invited visitors to construct and synthesize meaning through their encounters with the exhibited works.
The underlying concept of the exhibition can therefore be described as providing insight into our own creative and artistic processes. Art is not understood here as a finished and monolithic product, but rather as a mode of inquiry, a research practice, and, ultimately, a form of science communication.
Artworks and Content
By exhibiting objects, reference materials, and self-developed tools, we sought to make the production process transparent: How does one create something “out of the shadows” — both conceptually and artistically, but also on a very practical, hands-on level?
Rolodex
Since we consider our work as a form and format of art based reasearch, we use a lot of textual references from the literature in our daily practice. To exhibit the key texts, we created an automated Rolodex, that rotated and stopped at random intervals. Each card showed an excerpt and the source of a textual reference.
Fragments from Skopéin
Building on our prior exhibition at Karlsruhe, we displayed the “building blocks” that brought Skopéin into existence. Here, we wanted to show that our shadow-machines are usable as productive and creative toolsets.
VR-Skopéin
The initial version of Skopéin was shown as a large scale projection at the Stadtkirche Karlsruhe. As an artwork Skopéin was constructed as a deliberate engagement with the building’s architectural language. To showcase this outside of the physical architecture, we recreated the full architecture and the Skopéin projection as a VR-experience.
Collection of Shadow Images
A selection of digitally rendered shadow images that were created using a digital twin of the shadow image. Here, the iterative development in our artistic practice becomes apparent.
Umbra Machine
The Umbra Machine is an attempt to create a large scale version of the used prototypes and digital experiments of the shadow machines. It allows the visitors to create their own shadow images by steering and rotating three wheels that are powered by stepper motors. (A report of the building process can be found here.)
Music Machine
Inherently connected to the Umbra Machine is a PC running a custom built software. The idea behins this setup is to communicate the transformative qualities of shadows. While in the Romantics these transformations were also interpreted metaphorically, we decided to capture these transformations as media transformations. Specifically, we created a system that allows to use a live stream of the Umbra Machine’s shadows to create atmospheric music.
Shadowforming
Shadowforming is a process in which an object’s cast shadow repeatedly that through that process reshapes its own silhouette.
Shadow Palettes
Miniatures
Measurement-Tool
This tool was created to get hands-on and real-world experience on the light angles for the shadow machine (and ultimately for the Umbra Machine). This experiment made it obvious that we could not rely solely on digital simulations to create a physical shadow machine – the real world has too much phenomena (such as diffraction, diffusion, aberations, etc.) that can in theory be simulated digitally, but in combination are too interdependent for meaningful creative work.
Objects and References
Sediments
The exhibition was accompanied by selected works by Oliver Ruf, who investigated the conceptual qualities of the color blue as an index to individual imagination (as exemplified by multiple Romantic artists and writers).
Conclusion and Preliminary Reflections
We were very pleased with the response and feedback we received during the ten days of the exhibition. Many visitors spent considerable amounts of time in the exhibition space, which gave us the opportunity to speak with them, gather feedback, and document observations.
Furthermore, this was the first time that the whole output of our artistic collaboration — which had largely taken place through online sessions — was physically assembled and displayed in its entirety. This enabled us to experience the relationship between the individual works directly and to evaluate their interaction within an actual exhibition setting.
The following points provide a preliminary overview of some of the observations, lessons, and ideas that emerged from the exhibition.
Learnings
Visitors want something tangible to take home. Several visitors asked for a brochure, pamphlet, or comparable publication. We therefore plan to produce a retrospective catalogue or monograph containing references, documentation, and contextual information about the project and its development.
Virtual reality still requires explanation. A considerable number of visitors encountered virtual reality for the first time at our exhibition. Despite its increasing visibility, VR therefore appears to remain a relatively niche medium whose conventions and interaction paradigms cannot necessarily be assumed to be familiar to a general audience. What helped here was the soft “onboarding” by placing external context in the vicinity of the VR installation (-> the Skopéin fragments on the wall and the grotto sculpture helped to guide the visitors and lower the threshold)
Transporting artworks remains challenging. The main Shadow Machine was transported from Germany to Sweden by truck and air freight and sustained minor damage during transit. In retrospect, constructing the machine with a high degree of structural protection and robustness proved to be a sensible decision.
Staging, staging, staging. The scenography of an exhibition space mattered considerably more than we had initially anticipated. We had the opportunity to experiment extensively with placement, lighting, and staging on site, as we were given access to the exhibition space for two full days before the opening. This proved to be an extremely valuable privilege.
Personal mediation was highly valuable. Either Michael or Andi was present in the exhibition throughout its opening hours to guide visitors, provide context, and answer questions. Visitors appeared to appreciate this opportunity considerably. At the same time, our continuous presence enabled a form of ad hoc ethnographic observation through which immediate feedback and spontaneous visitor reactions could be documented.
The interactive machines facilitated social interaction. Our observations confirmed that the Music Machine and Umbra Machine encouraged conversations and interactions between visitors. We repeatedly observed groups collaborating to create interesting shadow images, which subsequently served as the basis for generating music.
Further Ideas for Exploration
Reconsidering the relationship between the Umbra Machine and the Music Machine. During the development process, we had implicitly understood interaction with the Music Machine—that is, the computer and its software—as analogous to playing a musical instrument. However, observing visitors and discussing the interaction between the two machines led us to reconsider this interpretation.Interaction with the computer might more accurately be understood as configuring or tuning an instrument, whereas interacting with the Umbra Machine itself constitutes the actual act of “playing” it. Although this distinction may initially appear minor, it has several conceptual and technical implications for future development.These include increasing the immediacy of the relationship between the shadow image, the Umbra Machine, and the Music Machine by reducing latency; reconsidering restrictive safety mechanisms in the Arduino code in order to enable faster rotation and more immediate interaction with the Umbra Machine; and using stronger stepper motors to reduce the required “pre-heating” time of the coils. Taken together, these modifications should enable a more immediate and direct mapping between shadow image, physical interaction, and sound.
Replacing mouse-based interaction with a touchscreen. Although the interaction paradigm implemented for the Music Machine was functional, navigation using a conventional computer mouse proved somewhat cumbersome and aesthetically unsatisfactory. A touchscreen could provide a considerably more direct and appropriate interaction modality in future iterations.
Combining the Music Machine with VR-Skopéin. Several visitors suggested combining the sound and music generated by the Music Machine with the VR-Skopéin installation. This appears particularly promising because the current version of VR-Skopéin does not yet include any sound. Connecting the two systems could therefore constitute an interesting future experiment and potentially establish a stronger relationship between the different components of the project.
Funding
The exhibition was partly funded by the Volkswagen Foundation as part of the initiative Wissenschaftskommunikation hoch drei (Andreas Siess) and by Capgemini (Michael Johansson).
Footnotes
