A Colloquium
on Art/Science/Spirituality Reconnections
Within Emerging Planetary Cultures
1st
Melilla Festival for the 5 Cultures
Melilla, Spain, 18-20 July 2004
Web Address: http://www.melillafestival.org.
Reviewed by Judy Kupferman
kupfer@post.tau.ac.i
The city of Melilla recently held its
first International Festival of Cultures.
This included a colloquium on Art/Science/Spirituality,
which took place in Melilla on July 18-20.
It was sponsored by the City of Melilla
together with Leonardo and the
Al Andalus Foundation. Melilla is a surprising
town. It is located on the north coast
of Morocco but has belonged to Spain since
1497. It features the most spectacular
display of Modernist architecture outside
Barcelona, along with an ancient fortress
and a lovely seafront. Perhaps its main
distinction is the fact that many cultures
live there in harmony: Moslems, Jews,
Christians, Hindu and Gypsies walk through
its streets with no apparent tension.
The conference reflected this diversity
and was, therefore, unusual. In addition
to the colloquium the festival featured
an exposition of art and concerts on the
beach, representing the various local
cultures.
The subject of the colloquium was art,
science, and spirituality with emphasis
on Middle Eastern culture. Participants
varied accordingly; rarely have I seen
such a variegated set of people, and the
remarkable experience of the conference
was in getting to know people from areas
both geographic and professional with
whom I would never otherwise have come
into contact. In addition, we were from
very different cultural and religious
backgrounds, and thus meeting on neutral
ground provided a rare opportunity to
begin to understand the different cultures
and world-pictures. After all, the main
theme behind the varied subject matter
was the world-picture, how we grasp the
universe and our place in it, be it as
scientists, artists, people of various
faiths and disciplines.
The moving spirits behind the conference
were Mohammed Aziz Chafchaouni of Morocco;
Roger Malina of Marseille, astrophysicist
and editor of Leonardo; and Julien
Knebusch of Leonardo/OLATS in Paris.
Participants at the conference included
scientists, artists, and scholars from
India, Egypt, France, Spain, the UK and
the US. Our Israeli contingent included
Eshel Ben Jacob, physicist and president
of the Israel Physical Society; Yael Katzir,
former student who now works with bacterial
art; Neora, digital artist; and I, a theatre
lighting designer and physics student
who have one foot in each world, so to
speak. We did not know quite what to expect
when we were invited, and were impressed
and surprised by the experience. For us,
as for many of the others, it was a rare
opportunity to meet people from very different
cultures and viewpoints. This situation
involved a certain amount of strain at
times and was not always an easy experience.
However, the festival activities smoothed
out this strain in many ways. Strolling
together through the art exposition and
listening together under the stars to
a thrilling flamenco performanceall
these helped in bridging barriers that
were not at all trivial. The warm and
special atmosphere of the city contributed
a great deal. Melilla is a relaxed place.
Drivers dont honk their horns. Women
in full Moslem dress stroll side by side
with girls in strapless tops, and nobody
seems disturbed by this site. People smile
easily and are friendly to strangers.
The conference included four sessions:
The first dealt with the relationship
between art, science and spirituality,
and the second with the role of computer
software in future culture. The third
focused on Islam, and on art, science
and spirituality within the Arabian-Spanish
world. The fourth centered around the
influence of cultural background on approaches
to art and science. A few examples of
the lectures may offer some idea of the
content. This brief survey necessarily
omits other interesting presentations,
but I have tried to give some idea of
the variety offered.
Roger Malinas lecture dealt with
the tension between the different cultures
of art and science as well as those of
engineering and technology, of different
world views and religions, and of regionalism.
Other lecturers embraced technology as
embodied by the internet: Mohammed Aziz
Chafchaouni together with American Harold
Brokaw described their "Virtual Geodesy",
an interactive computer program which
attempts to create relationships between
scientific data and cultural content.
Karla Schuch-Brunet of Brazil gave a survey
of the use of the internet as a vehicle
for social reform in Brazil. Dr. Fathi
Saleh of Egypt described the website he
has set up of Egyptian heritage (http://www.cultnat.org).
Some lectures centered around the arts
and literature. Leila Khalifa of France
spoke of the concepts of time and space
in the work of Ibn Arabi. Neora
(neora.com) of Israel described her experimental
theater production of "Medea_Ex."
This piece used a virtual 3D mythological
universe projected around the audience,
and the audience, represented as the chorus,
influenced the action using SMS messages.
Dr. Sangeetha Menon of India spoke of
consciousness research in light of Indian
dance drama.
Dr. Ahmed Moustafa, renowned Islamic researcher
and artist, discussed the geometric form
of Arabic script and its spiritual significance.
Dr. Moustafas talk focused on the
square shaped dot and its relationship
with the shapes of letters. In accordance
with the system of Arabic script devised
by Abbasid Wazir Ibn Mugla in the 9th
century, this reflects images of Islamic
mystical thought. Dr. Moustafa also spoke
of the cube, and, indeed, his own artwork,
a multicolored structure of cubes on cubes,
was on view in the exposition. Professor
Eshel Ben Jacobs lecture involved
a link between science and art. He described
self-organization among bacteria, as evidenced
by the beautiful artistic patterns they
produce. This lecture had unexpected drama:
The computer that was to project the Power
Point presentation would not function,
and Professor Ben Jacob finally decided
not to wait for its repair, placed one
slide that he had prepared in an overhead
projector and improvised a beautifully
clear presentation around the single slide,
which may even have proved more effective
than his original carefully prepared lecture.
An interesting insight into the relationship
of art and culture was provided on the
last day. In the morning Indian physicist
C.S. Unnikrishnan spoke of his theory
of "cosmic gravity", that is,
the effect of all masses on the universe
on each. The lecture was geared to the
layman, but evidently held detailed research
behind it. Professor Unnikrishnan prefaced
his lecture with talk about his own background
and the spiritual motivation behind his
scientific career. Two lectures later
in the day were by Western artists. Philippe
Boissonnet of Montreal described his work
with holograms. The lecture and pictures
were interesting, but it would have been
nice to see the holograms themselves!
Roy Ascott, a British artist with an impressive
record of academic positions who has spent
years of work on digital art, spoke of
the new vistas opening up to the artist
inspired by biophysics and biophotonics.
In the two days preceding the event, there
had been several comments about the opposition
or dichotomy of art and science. These
lectures seemed to contradict that. I
doubt very strongly whether Western scientists
would have prefaced a description of their
work with talk about their spiritual motivations,
and yet clearly there is spiritual motivation
behind any such work. Similarly the Western
background of the two artists probably
contributed to the clearly articulated
conceptual framework and methodology they
described; yet surely few artists of any
culture create without a conceptual framework
and methodology. One could see that, in
fact, art and science are not inherently
different activities but that the cultural
background of the speaker influences the
way he describes his work to others.
Many of the participants seemed to find
new food for thought in the meeting with
people of such different backgrounds and
fields. Artists dont usually attend
conferences together with scientists;
Moslems dont often talk about the
Quran with Jews. There was much
private discussion of the various issues.
One long discussion centered around the
very word "spirituality". Westerners
and particularly scientists rear back
at such a term. Yet it obviously is meaningful,
and it became interesting to consider
what, in fact, it means to all the different
people. The discussion lasted till the
small hours of the morning, and it seemed
many more hours would have been necessary
in order to reach a definite conclusion.
I asked my Israeli companions their impressions
of the conference and the festival. All
agreed that a major part of the experience
was the variety of people and world views
we met. This multiplicity of cultures
and religions were reflected in the city
of Melilla, itself with its multicultural
harmony, and lent significance to the
choice of this particular venue for the
conference. Eshel Ben Jacob pointed out
that in most scientific conferences the
audience significantly outnumber the lecturers:
Each session includes a few presentations
before the public, followed by questions.
In this case the participants of the conference
were themselves the audience, and as in
many cases they were not of the same field
as the lecturer. This situation provided
an opportunity for widening horizons and
for more immediate discussion than is
usual in more formal public situations.
It was, thus, possible to create a much
stronger relationship between the various
participants. In addition, the formal
structure of the conference included much
time together aside from the lecture sessions.
The informal discussions at the two-hour
mealtimes customary in that country provided
a rare chance to get to know each other.
The material presented at the conference
was interesting and valuable, enabling
a profound examination of values, of the
relationship of art and science, of the
concept of the spirit, and of mans
place in the cosmos. But perhaps the most
valuable and unusual aspect for all the
participants, I think, was the opportunity
to form relationships of friendship and
respect with people from significantly
different backgrounds and thus gain some
insight into extremely foreign world views.
It must be stressed that this is just
the beginning: This first Melilla conference
has shown that such a meeting of different
and even conflicting elements can succeed,
and it seems of first importance to continue
such events on an annual basis.