You have recently been working with physicists in search of evidence that would suggest
something can be proven to be factual. Are you working with any other people in other fields at the moment? Who would you like to work or collaborate with?
I am supposed to start a project in Italy with Vittorio Gallese, a neuroscientist in the buildup for the new science museum they are building in Rome.
I did some work with Kate Malone in ceramic to raise money for the charity Youth Zone https://www.onsideyouthzones.org/the-youth-zone-model/our-youth-zones/
I do a lot of work with the community: for example, at Rugby Portobello Trust where my work helps fund a creche for mums training to go back to work.
I have been consistently collaborating with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) for many years, raising awareness of the plight of refugees, raising money for them, and more generally inviting people to consider questions of how we are all connected.
I have been collaborating with Kostya for EVERYTHING IS CONNECTED, which is ongoing and will continue I hope until we can work no more. It is important to me for art and science to collaborate, so to invite people to consider that everything is connected. In this way, we might learn to live in peace and harmony, committed to appreciating and learning about the world around us.
I have also worked with heart surgeons at Hammersmith Hospital. They are brilliant, and we have since become friends. They still come to bring me wine after work and make me laugh. Thanks to them, I witnessed several open-heart surgeries and they shared their experiences with me about permanence/impermanence, the nature of our existence. It was a fascinating collaboration,
they gave me materials and ideas that led to
interesting new work.
I did a collaboration with the Griffith Institute at Oxford for the Tutankhamun show. I got really into ancient Egyptian poetry thanks to my friend Richard Parkinson (see: https://youtu.be/DOSb-m5miwI)
As for future projects, there are many. I would like to work Ragnar Kjartansson, an Icelandic artist. NASA, or any other space agency. I would like to do something with the CERN in Geneva. I would like to be commissioned to make a gigantic sculpture out of honey and hang it from the pyramid of the Louvre in Paris.
I must also mention I am going to teach at Cambridge for a bit. That is a dream. I love young people. Especially my children and their friends.
Are there specific friends or influencers whose work you would like to introduce to our readers?
Hilma af Klint
The National
Michael Sandel
The Law of Light (a book)
Best film ever about a squid – https://youtu.be/KySlJWFy2Qs
Yorkshire Sculpture Park
Storm King in America
The work of Paloma Proudfoot
The Meteora Mountains in northern Greece
Spring
I love youtube: the South Bank show interview with Werner Herzog and also Francis Bacon, BBC documentary about Seamus Heaney
Waking Up app with Sam Harris
Little violet sweets from that shop in Madrid
Honey from the Ruchers du Morvan
The work of Marina Warner
Fitou’s Thai Restaurant in Wormwood Scrubs
What new projects are you planning?
Work in Bolivian cloud forest
75