The Pervasive Media Studio and IOP Publishing are delighted to announce that designer Helen White will be the recipient of the Communicating Science graduate and new talent residency.

Following a career in the music industry, Helen recently graduated from UWE with a first class degree in Design: Materials/Process/Context. Her practice seeks to harness the power and unpredictability of natural phenomena in conjunction with technology, stimulating contemplative reconnections between environment and user by bringing a sense of event and performance to the architecture of our cities.

During this residency, Helen will be exploring the upsurge in the availability of information on a global scale, seeking to give form to an aesthetically bereft mass of data. With media attention on solar flares and their effects on positive events (the northern lights) or predicted negative events (technological disruption), she will be developing a  ‘solar wind chime’; an installation that is powered by real-time data triggering an audible and visual record of the movement of charged particles released from the sun. The unpredictability of witnessing this event aims to stimulate the viewer to engage with natural phenomena, which is often overlooked in our increasingly busy lives.

This residency will run from January to early April 2013. During this time, Helen will regularly share her progress online and participate in open discussions at Pervasive Media Studio.

Join us for our first event on 25 January, a free Lunchtime Talk (1-2pm) at the Studio, in which Helen will introduce her work and her plans for the residency.

We’re also planning a Showcase event at Watershed in April to share the outcomes of the residency. A date for this event will be announced shortly.

Watershed and IOP Publishing share a common interest in supporting emerging talent and developing entrepreneurism, and are delighted to be working together in partnership for the first time in support of this residency. We look forward to working closely with Helen as she develops her practice at the intersection of art, technology and the communication of physics.