Science is more meaningful, accessible, and memorable when it is communicated through stories. Microcosms is a scientific storytelling program at the American Museum of Natural History that brings scientists and artists together to create new collaborative science-themed stories. Microcosms is an NSF-funded program that will begin in 2022. During each year of the program, playwrights and scientists will work in pairs to collaborate on new scientific plays, and truthful performative stories. At the end of the collaboration period, the participants will present and perform their new works and stories to a live audience.
Microcosms promotes both storytelling for scientists and science for storytellers by investing in partnerships between scientists and artists. These collaborations are symbiotic: partners learn from each other and develop meaningful connections. Microcosms seeks to promote the stories of people who are historically underrepresented in science by featuring a diverse group of scientists and artists, and revealing the untold stories of influential scientists who have been overlooked in the past. Fostering a lasting and inclusive community of scientists and artists, and drawing the two worlds closer together, is at the heart of the Microcosms mission.
The first stories in Microcosms will feature astronomy, and will relate to science enabled by the Vera C. Rubin Observatory and the Zwicky Transient Facility. These telescopes in Chile and California photograph the Southern and Northern skies each night. They will find countless supernovae, explore distant galaxies, discover planets, and reveal the ever-changing night sky that surrounds us.