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The Art of Innovation

The Art of Innovation: Wonder Materials

Wonder Materials

BBC Radio 4 - The Art of Innovation, Wonder Materials

Ian Blatchford and Tilly Blyth on industrial change captured in The Man in the White Suit

Sir Ian Blatchford and Tilly Blyth focus on how the arrival of new synthetic materials shaped worries of post war industrial change depicted in the comedy The Man in the White Suit

Sir Ian Blatchford, Director of the Science Museum Group, and the Science Museum’s Head of Collections, Dr Tilly Blyth, continue their series exploring how art and science have inspired each other from the Enlightenment to dark matter.

They focus on a new post-war age of ambivalence in the relationship between art and science through a 1951 parable about the drive for new artificial textiles and the dangers of scientific hubris. 

The Ealing comedy the Man in the White Suit presents Britain seeking to relaunch itself as a high tech nation. It stars Alec Guinness as Sidney Stratton, a divisive chemist with the personal aim of making an indestructible synthetic fibre. It’s a potential boon for consumers but would deal a deathblow for the textile industry.

As Tilly reveals, the film reflects the mixed reactions to new synthetic substitutes for silk and cotton. It warns of the dangers of narrow minded scientific hubris, and shows how art can effectively address some of the big challenges we face in developing socially responsible technologies.   

Producer Adrian Washbourne

Produced in partnership with The Science Museum Group

Photograph by LMPC via Getty Images

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Factual: Science & Nature: Science & Technology

How art and science have inspired each other.

Sir Ian Blatchford and Dr Tilly Blyth explore how art and science have inspired each other.

In this landmark series, art historian and Director of the Science Museum Ian Blatchford and technology historian and Head of Collections of the Science Museum Tilly Blyth explore the art of invention and the invention of art and reveal the symbiotic relationship between the two. Many feel science takes the magic out of creativity. These programmes show how scientific advance facilitates creativity. And further, how artistic and scientific endeavour are inspired by the same desires and, often, are the result of intimate conversations between good friends. Galileo's painter friend Ludovicio Cigoli paints a maculate moon on the ceiling of the Sistine chapel and what does Galileo see when he looks through his telescope? A maculate moon. The poet Samuel Coleridge and the chemist Humphrey Davy were very close friends. Scientific innovators are creative thinkers. And the creation of art is dependent on technological development, as well as an aesthetic sense. Throughout history, artists and scientists have both desired to make sense of the world around them and change it, 

Produced in partnership with The Science Museum Group. 

Image credit: Science Museum Group Collection © The Board of Trustees of the Science Museum.

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