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Festival of Discovery, Dublin, 23 March to 16 April

A Festival of Discovery celebrating science and technology is to be
one of the first big events in Dublin’s year as European City of Culture.
It is the first time that a city has included science as a part of the cultural
programme since the scheme was launched in Athens in 1985.

Part of the reason for the recognition of science as an integral part
of culture may be due to the man in charge of Dublin ’91, Lewis Clohessy,
who is an engineer with a long-standing interest in the arts. It also reflects
the innovation and imagination that the Irish capital has brought to bear
to provide a bit of balance to Glasgow’s £50 million extravaganza
last year. Dublin is also making do with a small budget, 7 per cent of Glasgow’s.

Clohessy originally had £750 000 from National Lottery funds,
topped up with another £250 000 from EC and Dublin City coffers,
to spend. Last October he managed to cadge another £500 000 from the
government, and then doubled his bankroll with corporate sponsorships.

The Festival of Discovery reflects his own ability to combine science
and the arts successfully, and involves every-thing from hands-on exploration
and theatre to academic seminars and a meeting of Nobel prizewinners. Andy
Shearer has coordinated the festival events with the help of a voluntary
committee that includes space scientist Susan McKenna-Lawlor; Charles Mollan,
the Science and Arts Officer of the Royal Dublin Society, and representatives
of Eolas-the government’s science body-and several universities.

‘It will highlight the spirit of enquiry which is shared by the arts
and the sciences. It marks a less celebrated feature of Dublin’s cultural
life,’ says Ireland’s Minister for Science and Technology, Michael Smith.
‘We’re particularly honoured to welcome four Nobel prizewinners to join
Professor Ernest Walton, Ireland’s only Nobel laureate, in a public forum
during the Festival.’

The four (Sir Derek Barton, 1969; Arthur Schawlow, 1981; Sune Bergstrom,
1982; and Jean-Marie Lehn, 1987) will deliver lectures to specialist audiences
and then conduct a public forum on ‘Science and the Future’ at the Abbey
Theatre on 13 April.

Other events are aimed more directly at the general public. The Discovery
Dome, from Britain, is an interactive, travelling science exhibit based
originally on the Ontario Science Center in Canada. It will be erected in
Merrion Square, near the National Gallery and the National History Museum.
Its exhibits range from gravity and magnetism to optical illusions and tornadoes.
‘The Conquest of Form’, from 27 March to 27 April, is a computer art exhibition
by William Latham. It has been a major attraction at both the Natural History
Museum in London and in Bristol.

‘The Frontiers of Chaos’, the other major set piece, began on 7 March
and continues until 28 March. A display of computer graphics, the exhibition
is based on work from mathematicians and physicists at the University of
Bremen, Germany, and attempts to explain, mathematically, the unpredictable
nature of the Universe.

The National Museum is mounting a small display of scientific instruments
from its own collection starting 6 April.

The Molecule Theatre of Science from London will perform Gremlins in
the Works, a play for children about electricity and telecommunications
from 9 April to 13 April, while Lord Dynamite, an outdoor theatre piece
on the life of Alfred Nobel by Welfare State International has its world
premiere on 12 April at the Royal Hospital Kilmainham.

Other events include: a display by the Institution of Engineers of Ireland,
‘The Culture of Engineering’; ‘The Beauty of Physics’, the result of an
annual photographic competition organised by the Institute of Physics; and
‘Dance of the Universe/Cosmos’, two French exhibits from GLACS (Liaison
Group for Scientific Cultural Action), looking at the world of small particle
physics. There will also be programmes organised by the Irish Conservation
Organisation for Youth, the Irish Wildlife Federation, and a lecture on
‘Women in Irish Science and Technology’, .

Doug Payne is a science writer based in County Wicklow.