Krill looks and feelers: a dialogue on expanding perceptions of climate change data

In order to stir action on climate change, people beyond the scientific community need to make sense of the relevant data. When scientific data are expressed aesthetically, an appeal is made to our senses, which in turn leads us to attend to reason. This article examines the process of collaboration between artists and scientists. Moreover, the article itself, written in the voices of an artist and a scientist, is an example of one form of cross-disciplinary collaboration. It focuses on the case of Antarctic krill – key creatures in the marine food web that must be specially understood. The combination of artistic and scientific methods, and the use of new digital imaging methods, enable the representation of krill as beautiful living creatures rather than mere dots on a computer screen. This collaborative process exemplifies the kind of shift towards collective knowledge production that is a necessary part of communicating climate change data.