MAFA Project

Failures And Other Strange Scientific Objects that Science Should Be Studying

The path of science-making is fraught with rejection, failure and errors. “Rejection” when a scientistʼs article is not being accepted for publication, “failure” when an experiment does not succeed and “errors” when the wrong decisions are taken.  These are necessary stepping stones in the scientific process. By collecting examples of rejection, failures and errors (part of their research that the scientists have given up on), and reframing them, I am attempting to take a different look at the process of science-making and failure. Research will consist of collecting stories of failures in the lab and finding out how scientists deal with them. In the process, scientists are expected to become protagonists and full collaborators. Surveying the occurrence of failures in the lab, tampering with the established order of the scientific process and looking at failures in the living biological world to draw comparisons with the observers of this world (the scientists themselves) will form the core of the project.
The final work will comprise of documented experiments, and interpretations, presented in the form of posters, articles, lectures, educational videos as well as the display of artifacts pertaining to the discoveries made along the way.