Science and Culture: An ecosystem in the balance, captured ... · SCIENCE AND CULTURE Science and Culture: An ecosystem in the balance, captured in a work of art Gene Russo Editor

SCIENCE AND CULTURE

Science and Culture: An ecosystem in thebalance, captured in a work of artGene RussoEditor of Front Matter

As visitors approach the ominously titledsculpture Collapse, they may be puzzledby the pyramid of 455 one-gallon jars. Butas they step closer, it becomes clear thatmost of the jars, stacked 12 feet high and15 feet on each side, contain a multitudeof exquisitely detailed marine specimens.Other jars, however, are noticeably empty,and some hold small containers of tarry,black oil.

Collapse is a three-dimensional essay bornof scientific study and acute worry. Createdby artist Brandon Ballengeé, who is also anamphibian biologist at McGill Universityin Montreal, it reflects his deep concernsabout the state of the Gulf of Mexico in thewake of the Deepwater Horizon drilling rigdisaster in 2010. After an explosion sankthe rig and ruptured its well, over 4.2 millionbarrels of oil, according to government

estimates, spewed into the surrounding wa-ters over the course of nearly three months(1) [as did ∼300,000 tons of gas (2) and 7,500tons of dispersant (3)]. Ballengeé subsequentlytraveled to the Gulf and met with researchersin an attempt to assess the spill’s scope andits long-term ecological impacts.Soon after, the inspiration for Ballengeé’s

art project literally showed up on his door-step. Starting in the summer of 2010, beforeBallengeé had even conceived of Collapse,colleagues and friends in the Gulf startedsending him specimens, artifacts, and pho-tos related to the Gulf food chain. “In the

Collapse offers an artistic take on an ecosystem in peril. Installation by Brandon Ballengée with Todd Gardner, Jack Rudloe, Brian Schiering,and Peter Warny, 2010/2012. Image courtesy of Cultural Programs of the National Academy of Sciences.

www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1511803112 PNAS | July 21, 2015 | vol. 112 | no. 29 | 8801–8802

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beginning, I didn’t exactly know what to dowith them,” says Ballengeé, whose researchfocuses on deformities in amphibians. Even-tually he used more than 26,000 preservedspecimens representing 370 species of fishand other aquatic organisms to create a piecethat, he hopes, expresses something profoundabout the Gulf ecosystem and its ratherdire prospects.On June 11, 2015, Collapse, went on dis-

play at the Bemis Center for ContemporaryArts in Omaha, Nebraska. (It was at the Na-tional Academy of Sciences building inWashington, DC from November 2014 untilApril 2015.) But even when Ballengeé firstexhibited the piece in New York City at theRonald Feldman Fine Arts gallery in thespring of 2012, people were no longer talkingabout the disaster, he recalls. Instead, therewas a sense that the oil spill had been cleanedup, and that everything was back to normal.“I knew that wasn’t the case when talking toresearchers, looking at papers,” says Ballengeé.Although the Gulf has recovered to some

extent, recent studies have indicated seriousimpacts on Gulf life (4–6). Other studies sug-gest that tons of the oil, initially unaccountedfor, are actually resting at the bottom of theocean (3, 7–9). (Multinational energy com-pany BP, which owns the damaged well, hasdisputed the estimates for oil left behind, sug-gesting such studies have used flawed meth-odology.) Ballengeé likes to think that theNew York exhibition of Collapse helpedto raise awareness among its viewers, who

included Florida Senator Bill Nelson, a vo-cal critic of BP in the months and yearssince the spill.But Ballengeé is careful to point out that

although the piece was inspired by scientificresearch, it is not science. Instead, he soughtto draw in viewers and provoke an emotionalresponse: one that brought their eyes to thesespecimens while displaying their fragility andshowcasing how their diverse colors, shapes,and forms respond to light.Ballengeé curated each of the jars to make

it aesthetically compelling. The specimens aremounted on acrylic in glass to make themlook as though they’re “floating in space,”he says. Viewers are meant to feel compelledto look from every angle, getting a sense ofthe Gulf food chain. In the galleries where ithas been on display, viewers typically turn acorner before being confronted with thispyramid of preserved life. “They can’t escapeit,” says Ballengeé.

When environmental researcher KimWaddell was first invited to see the workas part of a National Academy of Sciencesevent last December, he was skeptical. Waddell,a senior program officer with the NationalAcademies Gulf Research Program, didn’twant to be part of an event with an alarm-ist message that suggested the Gulf’s eco-system had actually collapsed because ofthe spill. “I’m not a fan of hyperbole,” hesays, noting that it can undermine scien-tists’ credibility.But Waddell did attend, and was im-

pressed. He liked the way the species oc-cupied a three-dimensional space that evokedthe Gulf’s complex biodiversity and trophicinteractions, both at the water’s surface andhundreds of feet beneath the waves. “It helpedremind us that we really do need to think, bemore conscious about our footprint, not justcarbon footprint but our footprint on ecosys-tems,” says Waddell.Ballengeé, though, hopes the piece serves

as more than a vehicle for science outreach.He likes to see all his creations function asstand-alone works of art that allow viewers toinspect and react without being told whatthey should take away from the experience.“Science tells us about what’s going on, but

science doesn’t tell us about how we feelabout what’s going on,” says Carl Safina, anecologist and science communicator atStony Brook University in New York, whoauthored the 2011 book A Sea in Flames: TheDeepwater Horizon Oil Blowout (10). “Peo-ple don’t pay attention to facts unless there’san emotional relationship to the facts.”Safina saw Collapse in New York and haslong admired Ballengeé’s work.“It’s a mistake to think of this as outreach

for science,” Safina says, speaking of suchpieces. “Science should be compelling enoughon its own.” But he acknowledges a “dynamictension” in works of art that entail science, abalancing act between the didactic aim of re-laying information and the more artistic goalof creating a thought-provoking work thatelicits emotion.

1 McNutt MK, et al. (2012) Review of flow rate estimates of theDeepwater Horizon oil spill. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 109(50):20260–20267.2 Joye SB, et al. (2011) Magnitude and oxidation potential ofhydrocarbon gases released from the BP oil well blowout. Nat Geosci4(3):160–164.3 Kujawinski EB, et al. (2011) Fate of dispersants associated with theDeepwater Horizon oil spill. Environ Sci Technol 45(4):1298–1306.4 Rico-Martínez R, Snell TW, Shearer TL (2013) Synergistic toxicityof Macondo crude oil and dispersant Corexit 9500A(�) to theBrachionus plicatilis species complex (Rotifera). Environ Pollut173:5–10.5 White HK, et al. (2012) Impact of the Deepwater Horizon oil spillon a deep-water coral community in the Gulf of Mexico. Proc NatlAcad Sci USA 109(50):20303–20308.

6 Whitehead A, et al. (2012) Genomic and physiological footprint ofthe Deepwater Horizon oil spill on resident marsh fishes. Proc NatlAcad Sci USA 109(50):20298–20302.7 Valentine DL, et al. (2014) Fallout plume of submerged oilfrom Deepwater Horizon. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 111(45):15906–15911.8 Chanton J, et al. (2015) Using natural abundance radiocarbonto trace the flux of petrocarbon to the seafloor followingthe Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Environ Sci Technol 49(2):847–854.9 Ramseur JL (2010) Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill: The Fate ofthe Oil (Congressional Research Service, Library of Congress,Washington, DC).10 Safina C (2011) A Sea in Flames: the Deepwater HorizonBlowout (Crown, New York).

Among the many jars of Gulf specimens are small samples of oil from the 2010 spill.Installation by Brandon Ballengée with Todd Gardner, Jack Rudloe, Brian Schiering, and PeterWarny, 2010/2012. Image courtesy of Cultural Programs of the National Academy of Sciences.

8802 | www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1511803112 Russo

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