The exhibition Parallel Play: The Art of Science & the Science of Art was created as an integral component of Marquette University’s Biology class, Creative Problem Solving. This cross-disciplinary course teaches STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) students to embrace divergent thinking as a path to innovative problem solving. Through art-based activities and small group interactions with artists and STEM faculty, the class emphasizes the similarities between the creative processes of scientists and artists. The class is team-taught by Dr. Deanna Arble, Assistant Professor, Biological Sciences and Lynne Shumow, Curator for Academic Engagement, Haggerty Museum of Art.

Through the exhibited art pieces in Parallel Play, connections have been made between the work of artists and scientists with a special emphasis on the essential elements of scientific research—rejection, revision and the formulation of new ideas. Parallel Play aims to demystify the processes of innovation across disciplines and to illuminate the multiple routes of discovery and interpretation that art has to offer.
The Parallel Play exhibition is not currently on display, but all of the included pieces are part of the Haggerty Museum of Art’s permanent collection. Participants in the talk and tour will have the opportunity to view the featured work while touring the Haggerty’s storage vaults with Dr. Arble and Lynne Shumow. An informal lecture by Arble and Shumow about the Parallel Play exhibition and the Creative Problem-Solving class will precede the behind the scenes tour.
Participant will also be introduced to the current exhibitions on view at the Haggerty Museum of Art. https://www.marquette.edu/haggerty-museum/exhibitions.php