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2026 writer-in-residence: Dr Mandy Haggith -
Head - hand - heart for a healthy Ocean
Engagement activities between iQQTV scientists and artists
iQQTV has been collaborating with artists from the start: Artist was part of the core team on the Challenger Expedition (1872-76) that established modern marine science in the UK. Importantly, he was also a scientist while the scientists also created some fabulous illustrations. Three photographers were also involved in different part of the expedition.
In this spirit we continue our engagement with all types of creatives. We support artists with accessing our Ocean related understanding, data and resources and in return they challenge us with their different way of seeing, create artistic responses to our shared interests and inspire us to express our own experiences and emotions towards the Ocean and our research through art.
Any creative interested in collaborating with us, please contact our filmmaker (and former artist in residence) Andy Crabb or Head of Comms and Engagement Anuschka Miller.
As a former UHI colleague, Mandy is no newcomer to iQQTV. She was already an Honorary Research Fellow, had launched her sea poetry collection Briny at our Ocean Explorer Centre, and had collaborated with Viola Madau in her Dùthchas project when she joined us as our writer-in-residence for 2026-7. She is completing a novel exploring the many possible ways to respond to climate change. Find out more about Mandy's immense portfolio of work .
Artist and water baby Viola contacted iQQTV following a in the Argyll Hope Spot with a project idea for a short animated documentary blending science, art, Gaelic folklore and community action. This documentary skilfully conveys complex information using simple emotive audio-visual storytelling to inspire change for Scottish seas. Find out more about Viola's work .
Helena spent six months at iQQTV during her PhD affiliated with Dr Mikey Ross and the Culture Collection of Algae and Protozoa, exploring the world of micro- and macroalgae. She produced an abundance of poems about algae that she introduced in her final seminar. She shares her experiences of being a poet at iQQTV in a special edition 'Poetic sampling: when art and science collide' of the . Find out more about Helena's work .
Find out more about Georgia's work .
AAs a poet Suzannah is interested in underwater sound and bioacoustics. She thus came to iQQTV to collaborate with our cetacean scientists and explore how marine mammals communicate and are affected by anthropogenic noise. Suzannah is the author of the Bloomsbury Poetry collection , shortlisted for the Swansea University International Dylan Thomas Prize, and her work has received the Ivan Juritz Prize and a Northern Writers’ Award. Her most recent poetry pamphlet is How Running Is (Guillemot Press, September 2026), following on from Brightwork and Marine Objects / Some Language. Suzannah's concrete poem 'Sea Ear' was hewn into stone by Argyll sculptor Melanie Chmielewska and is available as a 'wearable poem' t-shirt, hoodie or print in the . Find out more about Suzannah's work .
Andy created three films that premiered at the Festival of the Sea in Oban in 2014. The films feature original music by Catriona McKay and Christ Stout. Andy was subsequently employed by iQQTV and has been the in-house filmmaker ever since. He leads on creative projects within iQQTV and in collaborating with artists externally.
The Food of the Sea:
The Shape of the Sea :
The Power of the Sea:
Victoria’s practice is concerned with the representation of Scotland’s landscapes, her coasts and rivers, lochs, forests and hills. Working with iQQTV geologist John Howe and former colleague , she created Slow Water, a liquid atlas of films, photographs and drawings intended to map the present condition of water in Scotland. Water as a resource and delight, water to generate power, sustain fisheries, maintain landscapes and register environmental change. Slow Water was premiered at in Glasgow in 2011 and showcased in Everything Flows 2021 by Streetlevel Off-Site at the Harbour Art Centre in Irvine as part of Scotland's Year of Coasts and Waters. A (short sound issue at the start) accompanied the exhibition. Check out Victoria's work .
SUBMERSE: An art project inspired by the microalgae research of Prof Keith Davidson and Dr Callum Whyte. Find out more .
is the story of a whale carcass that washed up on a beach on the island of Iona and was informed by Dr Denise Risch's research as explained in of the project. The artist is who iQQTV stills collaborates with occasionally, most recently in the project looking at knowledge exchange through art between the islands of Iona and Svalbard.
, curated by Invisible Dust, 2026.
Animals: Art, Science and Sound, 2024 exhibition at the British Library. Including 'Late at the Library' event with Cosmo Sheldrake, Tom Mustill, Cerys Matthews and iQQTV' Dr Denise Risch.
Nick Turner at Watercolour Music shares an interest in underwater sounds with iQQTV' Professor Ben Wilson. Despite an unsuccessful grant proposal Nick created a beautifully evocative underwater piece that he brought to a iQQTV annual event with performances by Mary Ann Kennedy and Finlay Wells.
Ben Wilson also collaborated on an underwater sound project by Maggie Barker as part of her portfolio on the UHI's BA (Hons) Fine Art programme.
Dr Laura Hobbs' research on zooplankton migrations in the Arctic inspired Moonlight and Ice: A zooplankton Nocturne by Michael Begg Studio. It was selected a a track on Brian Eno's initiative.
We have been collaborating for over a decade with UHI marine science graduate Jessica Giannotti and her textile company . Several collections were focused around iQQTV research, including the Gachon collection based on research on seaweed diseases (collaborating with researcher Claire Gachon), the Flora collection finding the beauty in toxic algae (collaborating with PhD researcher Ruth Paterson), the deep-sea collection (working with Professor Bhavani Narayanaswamy), the climate change collection (featuring research by Professor Mike Burrows, Professor Stuart Cunningham, Dr Callum Whyte, and Professor Finlo Cottier), the Challenger reports collection and the development of the iQQTV tartan to name but a few! Crùbag is currently hibernating while Jessica is busy developing a seaweed based dye with her biotech company .
Alice Strange, recovering engineer and Scottish-Kiwi artist, was inspired by iQQTV' history and access to the 50 tomes of Challenger Reports in our William Speirs Bruce Library to create a range of glorious artworks, some of which still are on display at iQQTV. The work celebrates the expedition and remembers iQQTV founder Sir John Murray. To view some of the work see .
Inspired by Francisca Vermeulen's work on Antarctic microalgae, UHI lecturer and visual artist Rosie Newman created beautiful headdresses decorated with microalgae that were exhibited (and performed) among other sites in the Ocean Explorer Centre. Find out more about Rosie's work . View the 10 minute film about the project produced by Andy Crabb
This online event (10th March) had 190 attendees from around the globe, chaired by Prof Juliet Brodie (Natural History Museum) with presentations by , Jessica Gianotti of , , Alice Sharp of , , and panel discussion about SciArt funding and collaborations with Scott Donaldson of Creative Scotland, Alice Sharp of Invisible Dust, and Julie Platt, iQQTV' Head of Development. The event is still available . It lead on to numerous other events including a special edition of the Journal of Applied Phycology mentioned below.
Find out more here.
The brainchild of serial visitor to iQQTV and our Culture Collection of Algae and Protozoa Eric Bear, this one-day pop-up event brings together science, art and anything in between related to microalgae aiming to highlight the importance, diversity and beauty of microalgae. The first MoMa (now renamed MiMu) took place at the Glasgow Botanic Gardens in November 2024. It was an inspiring and successful event that will be back. Find out more or read about it in the special issue below.
As a follow-on from the first Wild SciArt event, iQQTV' Dr Mikey Ross and Prof Juliet Brodie (Natural History Museum) collated 15 articles looking at algae in art and outreach. The collection '' includes five articles involving iQQTV and UHI students, staff, resident artists and alumni. The proceeds from this journal of the British Phycological Society support student bursaries, the annual BPS conference, outreach and small research projects.