Science x Humanities Events Inspired by Manus x Machina

By Alison Durkee

Last week, the Met unveiled its spectacular summer Costume Institute exhibition Manus x Machina: Fashion in an Age of Technology. Focusing on the processes behind haute couture and prêt a porter, the show illustrates the impact of machines on high fashion. Here are our top picks for complementary events in NYC that explore this intersection of science and technology with the arts and humanities.

This June, the World Science Festival will arrive once again in New York City, bringing world-renowned speakers with it. Delve into the science behind music at Flame Challenge: What is Sound?, a June 5 event studying the science of sound that will be moderated by actor and director Alan Alda. On June 3, science gets a theatrical twist at Light Falls: Space, Time, and an Obsession of Einstein. The production, led by famed scientist Brian Greene, tells the story of Einstein’s journey to discover the Theory of Relativity using animation, projections and an orchestral score.

Jenny E. Sabin, image by Matt Flynn

Science fans with an eye for design should check out Wanted Design NYC’s conversation on Design and Science on May 14. For a more psychological perspective, head to the Strand for a panel discussion on design and the Invention of Desire (May 19). Over at the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, you can still catch Pixar: The Design of Story, at least until August 7. The exhibition delves into the artistry behind Pixar’s blockbuster films, and also the technology, giving visitors an insight into how their favorite characters were created using Pixar’s high-tech computer animation programs. Also at the Cooper Hewitt on June 1 is a discussion with Jenny E. Sabin, an architect who takes a scientific approach to her work by using insights and theories from biology and mathematics to influence the design of material structures.

To look at the cutting-edge technology of the past, the Museum of the Moving Image is screening Computer Films of the 1960s from now through August 14. Artists, programmers and technicians worked together to create these innovative films, whose abstract computer-made images helped pioneer the use of CGI and the integration of computer images in cinema. One of the films influenced by these early productions is 2001: A Space Odyssey, whose creation is the subject of the Museum of the Moving Image’s exhibition To the Moon and Beyond: Graphic Films and the Inception of 2001: A Space Odyssey (through August 14). Over at the Morbid Anatomy Museum, visitors can see a different sort of midcentury technology in action with writer and comedian Eric Drysdale and his collection of 3-D images from the 1950s (August 18). The Stereo Realist 3-dimensional camera was the “virtual reality” of its time; it created both aesthetic treasures and technological marvels.

Hubble Cantata

Also at the Morbid Anatomy Museum, learn more about the influence of science on the arts at Surrealism and Alchemy, an illustrated lecture exploring the impact of alchemy on such surrealists as Max Ernst and Andre Breton (July 8). Science will impact the arts in a different way at Celebrate Brooklyn!’s world premiere of The Hubble Cantata on August 6. The work will combine music, electronics, rare footage from the Hubble telescope, and 6,000 virtual reality headsets, all coming together to show how science and the humanities can create something truly otherworldly.

Beyond things to do in NYC this weekend, keep up with all kinds of talks, lectures and activities in the big city. Sign up for Thought Gallery’s weekly Curriculum, the best of smart New York delivered right to your inbox.