LAURE WINANTS

Laure Winants is a research-based artist from Brussels. Her projects span the boundaries of science and art, embracing new technology and working with scientists in the field. Light, time, and space weave through her photographs, bringing data to life by activating a physical response in the viewer’s body. In 2022, Winants took part in the EIB’s Artists Development Programme, where she created a body of volcanic artworks using material gathered from Fagradalsfjall volcano on a trip to Iceland to work with a glaciology research group from Háskóli Íslands University.

Most recently, Winants set out on a four-month polar expedition with a multidisciplinary team of researchers, setting up an artist’s studio in the heart of the Arctic ice pack. Immersed in the immense white desert, she developed techniques to capture the optical and luminous phenomena unique to the region. Using environmental sensors, she allowed the environmental matter to create the works, free from human interaction. The resulting artworks, Time Capsule, are, in the words of the artist, “prints of photograms onto which ice cut-outs captured on site have been affixed. Polarized light on the material reveals the composition of the cut-out. It reveals the structure of the crystals but leaves a shadow over certain elements that have been present for millions of years.” By listening to the fragility of the ever-changing polar landscape, Winants reveals a universe seen through the prism of nature itself, where ice and light filter our vision.

Winants is motivated by a deep desire to advance awareness of the climate crisis. She says, “All too often we are missing a visual translation, a bridge between scientists and non-scientists. But we are more sensitive to stories than numbers.” Her work is sensory, luring you in with its colourful shadows. This, she hopes, will connect the viewer with the science.