The Fletcher Lab in the Department of Bioengineering at Berkeley will host their annual art show on May 18, 2012 from 5-8 pm in the B1 Atrium of Stanley Hall. This year is the ninth annual Fletcher Lab Art Show.

I discussed the Fletcher Lab Art Show with Viviana Risca, a member of the Fletcher Lab. In the Fletcher lab’s original lab space, the only windows happened to be in the microscopy rooms and had to be covered.  As Professor Daniel Fletcher puts it, “We had quite a bit of wall space in our ‘urban cave’ but nothing much to look at.” Along with the original group of students and postdocs, he started the Lab Gallery, as it was originally called, as a way to stimulate artistic creativity, have fun, and invite others in the biophysics and bioengineering communities to get to know the Fletcher Lab a little better.

The narrative usually goes something like this: a naïve scientist invents a clever piece of technology designed to improve the quality of life in the developing world, only to be shocked and horrified when it is not wholly embraced by the people it was designed to help. Of course, such characterizations could not be further from the truth. Many scientists, especially those working on technologies for the developing world, take on challenges precisely because of their desire to address human-level complexity. The fact that difficulties arise on occasion comes as neither a surprise nor a disappointment to them. It’s just part of the job.