Collaborating with Artists in the Search for Life

Art and science collaborations that go beyond outreach and advertisement in service of science have the potential to unlock new ways of seeing and understanding the Universe that science alone cannot reach. In this white paper for the NASA Decadal Astrobiology Research and Exploration Strategy (DARES) request for information, we outline examples and benefits of artscience and research-creation methods for astrobiology. The search for life and its origin is inherently interdisciplinary and requires novel approaches that could benefit from the training artists receive in design thinking, contextualization, speculation, and community building. We take a look at this process in action through the work of Robert Irwin during the 1970 NASA Habitability Symposium, Carl Sagan's approach to mixing art and science, and the Transition Design framework of creativity-led problem solving. Each example underscores a specific advantage of deeper art-science collaborations: Irwin's creative approach to problem-solving broke scientists from conventional thought patterns, Sagan's contextualization helped align scientific work with ethical and societal considerations, and design-led research is shown to improve planning and efficiency, even for problems as complex as searching for life. Specific implementation recommendations include specifically allowing funding for artist consultations in research grants, reviving NASA's artist-in-residence program, and supporting artscience training initiatives within the astrobiology community.