By Steven Simpson, Royal Society
The Big Draw festival can be a beautifully simple way to communicate sciences to new audiences by utilising the links between science and art. The Royal Society recently hosted a Big Draw event for the second year running, but this time it was carefully themed on a 350 year old book and involved a much bigger programme of activities, involving many individuals and organisations working with the Royal Society.
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The recent Royal Society Big Draw event called Seeing Closer, on 17 October 2015, celebrated the 350th anniversary of Robert Hooke's Micrographia. Often referred to as the first popular science book, Micrographia was Hooke's observations of the world through lenses, so Seeing Closer was a free day exploring the science behind making observations of the microscopic world, through art and imagery related to Micrographia.
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'We felt this was a wonderful event for sparking the curiosity and creativity of young people' - a family visiting Seeing Closer
The day included so many activities that listing them all would take a lot of room, so here are some highlights: drop in microscopy workshops run by the Gurdon Institute, University of Cambridge; hands on children's activities explaining how lenses work by Little House of Science; crash courses in scientific illustration from Mell Fisher; lectures on Hooke and microscopy; and a build your own microscope workshop. The microscopy workshops from the Gurdon Institute involved looking at samples of bacteria, rock and small creatures with microscopes and drawing observations. Such a simple cross over between science and art was really popular and there was an inspiringly diverse range of people taking part.
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'He [son] is having so much fun he asks why we have to leave and if he can sleep here' - a parent visiting Seeing Closer
The number of visitors at the Royal Society Big Draw event was almost double the previous year, and a surprising amount of feedback wanted more activities, despite the expanded programme. Let’s see what 2016 brings for the Big Draw!
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