Frances Rylands

Discipline: Geography

Project Summary

Project Title:

Entanglements of creative practice and policy: Art/Science collaborations along the Jurassic Coast World Heritage Site.

Funding Body:

AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Award with the Jurassic Coast World Heritage Site.

Project Description:

The Jurassic Coast World Heritage Site; a compelling landscape of outstanding beauty and universal value.  Due to the early developments of earth science in the region it has been recognized as a key location in the history of scientific knowledge and understanding.  But this is not the only form of enquiry.  The Jurassic Coast is the only World Heritage Site with a formal Arts Programme.  This landscape is a crucible of knowledge, a site of learning, discovery and exploration.  It is a place viewed from many different perspectives and through many lenses.  Often described as a giant classroom, this coast is a meeting point of individuals and organisations, scientists and artists.  This research hopes to undertake an ‘inside-out‘ study of the boundaries between these meeting points, exploring how they are negotiated, tested and broken down.

Initial research questions include:

  • How, and to what end, has the Jurassic Coast Arts Programme and associated collaborations negotiated Arts-Science practice?
  • How do the varied arts-science collaborations along the Jurassic Coast contribute to our understanding of arts-science practice?
  • What are the politics of art-science practice along the coastline?
  • What is the geography of arts governance along the Jurassic Coast WHS?
  • Does the Jurassic Coast Arts Programme encourage participating institutions and governing bodies to ‘imagine’ their sites differently?
  • What arts policy lessons from the Jurassic Coast are transferable to other locations and situations, including other WHS and places with dynamic landscapes?

Supervisory Team

Dr Nicola Thomas

Nicola.J.Thomas@exeter.ac.uk

Dr Caitlin DeSilvey

c.o.desilvey@exeter.ac.uk

 

 

Wider Research Interests

My academic interests include landscape, performance arts, heritage, art history, popular geopolitics and postcolonialism. In addition to my cultural and historical interests within geography I have a strong scientific understanding and have always enjoyed communicating in the languages of both science and art.