The Open Mind, Hosted by Alexander Heffner
Oct 19, 2026 · 28 min · 10 segments
Coauthors Janani Balasubramanian and Natalie Gosnell discuss their book "Art-Science Undisciplined: A Playbook for Transformative Collaboration"
Natalie GosnellGuest
Janani BalasubramanianGuest
Alexander HeffnerHostNatalie, help us get to the crux of this in terms of what this playbook looks like and how you delineate it, how you describe this playbook.
So the subtitle of the book is a playbook because play and joy is actually really key part of what we believe to be mutually transformative collaboration between artists and scientists.
And in building out our methodological framework, we have sort of a phase process to help guide artists and scientists and their supporters.
through the relationship work that's necessary to build these meaningful collaborations.
And we use a sort of gardening or plant tending metaphor to frame all of this because it really does take work.
It takes intention and energy and time in order to invest in this newfound collaboration and where it might go in the future.
It's about the individual work that practitioners and supporters need to do in order to enable a type of mutual transformative collaboration that we're calling for.
Because a lot of the transactional exchanges that can happen between art and science are restricted by the sort of disciplinary siloing that has happened that we're all sort of institutionalized in.
And then beyond that, we start talking about sort of building up the seeds of the collaboration or collaborations start to imagine what might be possible together.
Is this a collaborative partner that is sort of going to go the distance with you, working towards the kind of messy middle of collaborative work? thinking about germination of that idea, moving towards blossoming and maturation, which can happen several years down the line, but that's when the work of a collaborative team is starting to come to fruition and is being shared with the world.
And then also those practitioners are starting to understand and experience the benefits of experiencing these long-term collaborations.
Their personal selves and also their personal professional networks starting to... benefit and improve because of these collaborative journeys.
Natalie, help us get to the crux of this in terms of what this playbook looks like and how you delineate it, how you describe this playbook.
So the subtitle of the book is a playbook because play and joy is actually really key part of what we believe to be mutually transformative collaboration between artists and scientists.
And in building out our methodological framework, we have sort of a phase process to help guide artists and scientists and their supporters.
through the relationship work that's necessary to build these meaningful collaborations.
And we use a sort of gardening or plant tending metaphor to frame all of this because it really does take work.
It takes intention and energy and time in order to invest in this newfound collaboration and where it might go in the future.
It's about the individual work that practitioners and supporters need to do in order to enable a type of mutual transformative collaboration that we're calling for.
Because a lot of the transactional exchanges that can happen between art and science are restricted by the sort of disciplinary siloing that has happened that we're all sort of institutionalized in.
And then beyond that, we start talking about sort of building up the seeds of the collaboration or collaborations start to imagine what might be possible together.
Is this a collaborative partner that is sort of going to go the distance with you, working towards the kind of messy middle of collaborative work? thinking about germination of that idea, moving towards blossoming and maturation, which can happen several years down the line, but that's when the work of a collaborative team is starting to come to fruition and is being shared with the world.
And then also those practitioners are starting to understand and experience the benefits of experiencing these long-term collaborations.
Their personal selves and also their personal professional networks starting to... benefit and improve because of these collaborative journeys.
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