Troubled Horizons
As part of our Art of Innovation exhibition, we explore three innovations that brought art and science together to see the world from a different perspective. Each is embodied in an artwork in the Science Museum Group Collection.
Art has always been part of the Science Museum. From the museum’s origins in the Great Exhibition of 1851, to our founding collections that moved from the Patent Museum in 1909, we have always had art and science in dialogue.
Today, the museum’s art collections comprise over 15,000 objects, ranging from the 1500s to now, including paintings, prints, drawings and sculpture, kinetic and digital works.
The arts feature in our permanent galleries, exhibitions, research and events programmes, and we regularly commission new works from contemporary artists. We think that art can help people to look at science differently and that science asks different questions of the arts.
Here we bring together stories about art and science from our exhibitions and galleries, highlights from the collection, discussion of past projects, and blogs that delve into some key moments when the arts and sciences have shaped each other, both in the world, and in our collections.
The Art of Innovation
Catch the thoughtful and engaging series The Art of Innovation: From Enlightenment to Dark Matter on BBC Radio 4, presented by Sir Ian Blatchford, Director of the Science Museum Group, and Dr Tilly Blyth, Head of Collections & Principal Curator at the Science Museum,
The series first ran in 2019, when BBC Radio 4 and the Science Museum Group embarked on an exciting partnership exploring the relationship between art and science over the past 250 years. As well as the 20-part radio series, the Museum hosted an exhibition that expanded on the themes addressed in the series, and published an accompanying book with further stories appearing online.
The Art of Innovation: Stories
Art on display
‘Santa Medicina’ by Eleanor Crook
On display in the 'Faith, Hope and Fear' gallery in Medicine: The Wellcome Galleries.
© The Board of Trustees of the Science Museum, London
'Self-Conscious Gene' sculpture by Marc Quinn
On display in the 'Faith, Hope and Fear' gallery in Medicine: The Wellcome Galleries.
© The Board of Trustees of the Science Museum, London
'Bloom' kinetic sculpture by Studio Roso
On display in the 'Medicine and Us' gallery in Medicine: The Wellcome Galleries.
© The Board of Trustees of the Science Museum, London
'For Science' by Jenny Holzer
On display in the ‘Faith, Hope and Fear’ gallery in Medicine: The Wellcome Galleries.
© The Board of Trustees of the Science Museum, London
Coalbrookdale by Night by Philippe Jacques de Loutherbourg, 1801
On display in Making the Modern World gallery
© The Board of Trustees of the Science Museum, London
'Iron Baby', Edition AP III/III, by Antony Gormley, England, 1999
On display in Who Am I? gallery
© The Board of Trustees of the Science Museum, London
Anamorphosis painting of a perspective stern view of a ship model, c.1744-1774
On display in Mathematics: The Winton Gallery.
© The Board of Trustees of the Science Museum, London
The Munition Girls, by Alexander Stanhope Forbes, 1918
On display in Making the Modern World.
© The Board of Trustees of the Science Museum, LondonExplore...more stories on art and science
Landscape Artist of The Year 2024 winning commission
Discover the winning commission of Sky Arts’ Landscape Artist of the Year competition at the Science Museum.
The Science Museum Group was this year’s collaborating institution, and asked the competition’s winner, artist Monica Popham, to paint a work that captures the story of Orkney’s role in the UK’s transition to low carbon and renewable energy. Find out more about the painting and its commission on our blog.
Orkney and the Energy Within by Monica Popham can now be seen on display on Level 2 between Mathematics: The Winton Gallery and the Information Age gallery or you can find more information on Collection Online.
Highlights from our collection
'Living Made Easy' by Thomas McLean, print, London, England, 1830
© The Board of Trustees of the Science Museum, London
Star Portrait of Helen Sharman - The First Briton in Space, by Kyle Dawney
© The Board of Trustees of the Science Museum, London
Materials House by Thomas Heatherwick, 1999
© The Board of Trustees of the Science Museum, London
Painting of Sunspot by James Nasmyth, 1860
© The Board of Trustees of the Science Museum
Barbara Hepworth's Surgery Sketchbook, 1948
© Barbara Hepworth (Enquiries regarding permissions to use to the Science Museum, London)
