I am interested in the rich ecotone — the boundary territory — between art and science.

Around the time of Homo habilis, I studied video and other time arts at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Currently, my creative practice focuses on mixed media, fiber, and drawing & painting. My artwork has been exhibited in galleries and museums in the US and in Europe.

A lifelong interest in botany and entomology led me to work as a lab technician in three different research labs over a period of about a decade. For three years, I worked with Anna Edlund lab at Spelman College, focusing on pollen tube behavior in Arabidopsis thaliana and other Brassicaceae. During those years, I collected a lot of pollen in the field and from botanical gardens, and became adept at confocal microscopy. I also started to catalyze relationships between artists and scientists, including a collaboration with the Seattle performance art group Lelavision. For the next three years, I was a lab tech for Nicole Gerardo’s lab at Emory, working with microbial symbionts of pea aphids as well as with several of the lower Attines (fungus-growing ants related to leaf-cutters).  At Emory I worked with microbiology, kept a greenhouse, and started up an art-science outreach program. After that, I was an outreach coordinator for about four years for DiscoverLife, based at the University of Georgia School of Ecology, where I led citizen science programs to collect photographic data on bees, moths, plants, and other organisms to study large-scale ecology.

For over two decades, I have taught art-science workshops, curated art-science exhibits and performances, and led other activities for creative science engagement. From 2016-18, I founded and directed an art-science residency program in the Southern Appalachians for two years, called Art + Science In the Field: AS IF Center. Professional development activities include the National Academy of Sciences Colloquium on the Science of Science Communication, and Two Cultures Converging Conference, NYC 2017.  My teaching page lists many of the colleges, universities, biological field stations, museums, and other institutions where I have taught art-science workshops or presented about art-science. Visit this page for selected art-science collaborations that I have catalyzed and led since the early 2000s. Currently I am leading a network of biological field stations, marine labs, and long term ecological research sites (LTERs) that offer artist in residence programs.

Contact me: sciencecandance@gmail.com