Engineering Beauty (original) (raw)

Abstract

'Bridging Art and Science in the 21st Century: Engineering Beauty. The Beauty of Engineering.' Inter-disciplinary talk held at Sorbonne Université Abu Dhabi, Oct. 23rd 2019. Bridging Art and Science in the 21st Century: The Beauty of Engineering. Engineering Beauty. In what meaningful sense can art be described as a science? Is it possible to legitimately define science as an art? This collaborative initiative attempts to address such questions by bringing together scholars from across the Humanities and the Sciences through a series of unique cross-disciplinary encounters. The aim is to build new bridges by identifying points of convergence and intersection, common concerns that give rise to new ways of approaching the challenges faced in the 21st century. The first seminar is organized through collaboration between the Department of Archeology and History of Art (SUAD), the Department of Science and Engineering (SUAD), and the Healthcare Engineering Innovation Center (HEIC) at Khalifa University. The aim is to stage a conversation between the engineer and the art historian around the concept of beauty. Cesare Stefanini, Professor of Biomedical Engineering at Khalifa University, Director of HEIC and active in the field of Human Centered Design, will approach this issue by focusing on the question of function. An object’s aesthetic appeal, he argues, is rooted in the act of production: it assumes a particular shape because it is built with a precise purpose in mind. Dr. Robert Kilroy, lecturer on the Masters in History of Art and Museum Studies at SUAD, will then focus on the question of intention. An object’s aesthetic appeal, he argues, is rooted in the effect it produces: it provokes a feeling of sensible pleasure because it is entirely without purpose. The ultimate aim is for these seemingly separate viewpoints to combine as a single inter-locking perspective. Looking at art from the perspective of science, we arrive at a renewed appreciation of the beauty of engineering. Approaching science form the position of art, we come to new understanding of how beauty is engineered. Such an overlap marks the ground for a new mode of exchange where the space between disciplines (“inter”) is replaced by a focus on the space within (“infra”). Through this shift, the notion of ‘bridge building’ is radically transformed: rather than strive to simply connect two distant locations, we recognize that a single terrain is already divided from within.

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