Art | Science | Design: aesthetic representation of weather and climate

Hear from visiting artist Leah Beeferman (Rhode Island School of Design) and climate scientist Professor Andy Hogg (Director of Australia’s Climate Simulator, ACCESS-NRI), in conversation with Dr Pia Van Gelder (ANU School of Art & Design), convened by Dr Anna Madeleine Raupach.

Presented by the School of Art & Design Computational Culture Lab, this discussion brings together artistic and scientific perspectives on visually representing complex environmental phenomena related to weather and climate.

Date: Wednesday 11th June
Time: 5:30 – 7pm
Venue: ANU Sir Roland Wilson Building Theatrette 2.02
Online: Zoom

As the realities of climate change become increasingly urgent, both artists and scientists are grappling with how to make complex environmental data tangible and emotionally compelling.

The aesthetic representation of weather and climate is not simply about illustration – it is a way of translating systems and phenomena that are distributed across time and space. How can image, sound, and simulation help us perceive and understand environmental change, and what are the limitations of such representation? This conversation explores a growing field where creative practice meets scientific modelling, asking how aesthetic strategies can contribute to public understanding, environmental narratives, and speculative futures.

About the speakers:

Leah Beeferman works with digital image-making, video, text, and sound. Her work explores and abstracts the shifting relationships between measurement and uncertainty as they relate to landscape and weather at a variety of scales. Recent solo exhibitions include the Penumbra Foundation, New York and Peeler Art Center, Indiana. She is now based in Providence, where she teaches at the Rhode Island School of Design.

Andy Hogg is an oceanographer who specialises in modelling the Southern Ocean. Andy did his PhD at the University of Western Australia, and has worked at Southampton Oceanography Centre and the ANU. He is currently Director of Australia’s Climate Simulator, ACCESS-NRI, and a Chief Investigator of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Weather of the 21st Century.

Image: Leah Beeferman, Weather of the Weather 1, 22.5x40", 2023.