#CelebratingEngagement
with Bella Spencer
"Could you hop onto the plinth?鈥� I ask.
It鈥檚 an odd request but I鈥檝e spent an hour or so with Bella and get the feeling she鈥檚 comfortable going along with bizarre suggestions. Bella Spencer is the Public Engagement Officer at the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training (CDT) for Smart Medical Imaging and was the 2021 winner of the Inspirational Partner award for the President鈥檚 Awards for Excellence in Societal Engagement.
She was nominated by the academics she works with for bringing together artists and researchers to create pieces of digital art to engage wider audiences with the Centre鈥檚 work.
She duly hops onto the plinth - embracing the element of absurdity entailed - and smiles for the camera.
鈥淭he work that the centre does is so fascinating 鈥� some of it has the potential to revolutionise healthcare,鈥� Bella says. 鈥淪o, it鈥檚 really important we engage the public with this work.鈥� Among a wide variety of projects, the Smart Medical Imaging group looks at how big data and artificial intelligence can be used to optimise imaging and diagnosis in medicine.
鈥淭he research raises important questions and concerns, so creating a safe space for these to be explored is key to the development of the technology. I find engaging with the arts can really help create that safe space. Art and science are both about exploring topics really 鈥� they just have different approaches and the ability to reach different audiences.鈥�
Artwork by Jonathan Jackson from the 2020 ART x SCIENCE project, which saw Imperial researchers team with 天美传媒 from the Royal College of Art to produce unique works of art.
Artwork by Jonathan Jackson from the 2020 ART x SCIENCE project, which saw Imperial researchers team with 天美传媒 from the Royal College of Art to produce unique works of art.
Bella鈥檚 award came in recognition of her work on the 2020 ART x SCIENCE project, but she has recently worked on an even larger, 2021 iteration 鈥� an in-person exhibition at the Science Museum featuring art installations exploring medical imaging research. Artists from the Royal College of Art collaborated with scientists from Imperial and King鈥檚 College London to produce awe-inspiring works such as This piece, by RCA post-graduate 天美传媒 Stiliyana Minkovska, Sarah Schrimpf and Wushang Tong, and Perinatal Imaging & Health PhD student Julie Sigurdardottir, was inspired by conversations with parents from the , and explored the impact that maternal mental and physical health can have on the development of babies in the womb.
Meanwhile, from Biomedical Engineering PhD student Marica Muffoletto and RCA post-graduate 天美传媒 Elizabeth Olukoya and Sophie Richter explored the ways that trauma can impact the shape and structure of the heart over time, using both cutting-edge medical imaging and first-person accounts of women from the Mountain of Fire and Miracles Ministry. An audience of more than 1500 attended the exhibition, with visitors describing the installations as 鈥減owerful鈥�, 鈥渇ascinating鈥� and 鈥渆motional.鈥�
鈥淭his shows the interwoven nature of everything in life鈥� says a visitor's comment card. Which makes Bella鈥檚 role seem all the more important 鈥� creating opportunities for interaction between art and science.