The research project ʻHow Norway Made the World Whiterʼ (NorWhite) studies a Norwegian innovation; the white pigment titanium dioxide in a historical, aesthetic, and critical lens—focusing on how the pigment transformed surfaces in art, architecture, and design. The primary research question is: What are the cultural and aesthetic changes instigated by titanium white and TiO2 surfaces – and how can both the material in itself and these changes be conceptualized and made visible? NorWhite connects challenging topics - whiteness, technological innovation, and mass-exploitation of natural resources - in a single case study. The project will do this through an interdisciplinary research design grounded in an original and creative humanities approach that merges art history and artistic research.
To operationalize the overall objective, NorWhite is divided in interlinked Work Packages with different size and scope: WP1) Archival research – building a database from a vast never-before studied archive, WP2) Norwegian white – investigating narratives of white aesthetics, modernism, and national identity, WP3) White context – understanding white color in art, architecture and design in a wider context, WP4) Artistic research – visualizing aesthetic properties from TiO2 to smart materials, and WP5) contextualizing by research-based exhibition making and extensive public engagement and outreach in collaborations with public institutions and industry stakeholders.
By weaving together historical, critical, aesthetic, and artistic methods with public engagement, curating, and research-based exhibitions, NorWhite will reveal a complex and challenging story of how a local Norwegian innovation came to have planetary consequences.
The major outcomes of the project will be an international symposium, a two-weeks research studio open to the public, two edited books, and two research-based exhibitions.
www.tio2project.com
