Announcing special gallery hours! Meet the collaborators behind the exhibition Symmetries & Broken Symmetries: Shanthi Chandrasekar and Michael Albrow — now on view in the Upstairs Gallery — during special gallery hours on Wednesday, May 6 (1pm-2pm and 4pm-5pm) and Friday, May 29 (1pm-2pm), link in bio to register.
The exhibition pairs the artwork of Shanthi Chandrasekar with writings by physicist Michael Albrow in a fascinating exploration of order and chaos. You can also see the show during guided tours of the historic NAS Building, with new dates available throughout May.
Images: Shanthi Chandrasekar, Kolam - Aditya (Sun), 2018, acrylic on canvas, 40 x 30 inches.
Shanthi Chandrasekar, Kolam - Aishwarya (Earth), 2018, acrylic on canvas, 40 x 30 inches.
As a multidisciplinary artist, designer, and educator, @fitgisaintlouis aims to show how art can make collective memory visible and strengthen community life. Saint-Louis’s work can be understood as a form of social infrastructure—her pieces are not simply aesthetic objects, but sites of encounter. They invite reflection, conversation, and recognition within the public landscape, contributing to the social fabric of neighborhoods. Their openness allows viewers to project their own stories onto them.
Read more about Saint-Louis’s work at the link in our bio. Art curated by @cpnas .
With the rapid progress that we’re making with android robots and AI, it’s difficult to plan a human mission to Mars with humans being the centerpiece of the expedition. To what extent do you assist them?
But there are a lot of reasons to send humans and not just robots to Mars and other extraterrestrial places.
An excerpt from the Feb 19, 2026 DC Art Science Evening Rendezvous on the Human Exploration of Mars featuring @spacetimeartist and @richellellisart .
#cpnas #lasertalks #sciart
Nothing beats seeing a film on the big screen—especially at @thenasciences gorgeous theater! Our latest feature, OBSERVER, was honored with an award for Outstanding Artistry at @dceff_org (Tip: The film is FREE for educators to use via our website.) Our ED @ssgoodwin shares some behind-the-scenes highlights from an unforgettable night of science and cinema below:
"Last Saturday, we had an incredible screening of #ObserverFilm at the Environmental Film Festival in the Nation's Capital (#DCEFF). The film was recognized with the Flo Stone and Roger D. Stone Award for Outstanding Artistry in Filmmaking, which was a true honor and a testament to the vision of director Ian Cheney @wickedelicate and the multidisciplinary team behind the project.
The screening took place at the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine in their beautiful theater (see photo below), a space typically used for lectures but transformed for the evening with a massive screen. The scale of the screen, the acoustics, an engaged audience, and the thoughtful questions afterward all made for a memorable viewing experience.
It was also a pleasure to share the stage with Dallas Hudson and to learn more about his practice of observation in his own backyard. For more than 28 years he has walked his land and documented over 600 species, building an extraordinary body of knowledge through sustained attention and care. It was especially meaningful to hear the audience give him such an enthusiastic round of applause when he walked on stage.
One of my lasting takeaways is how meaningful events like this are, where people can come together for a shared experience and dialogue. I deeply appreciate the work of film festivals like DCEFF and the many many many organizations creating opportunities to engage with science in community.
Many thanks to the teams at @cpnas and DCEFF, to Flo Stone, and to everyone who joined us for the event. And to the @moorefound for making this film possible."
Photo credits: Joy Asico/DCEFF
What does it take to bring science to life on screen? 🎥 🎞️
We caught up with past SciComm Excellence Award winners @clarefieseler and Sarah Goodwin of @scicommlab at the DC Environmental Film Festival (@dceff_org ) to talk about curiosity, storytelling, and why film is such a powerful way to communicate science.
Ready to share your own story? Applications for our #scicomm awards 🏆 are open until Friday at 11:59 PM ET — don’t miss your chance to join creators like these!
🔗 Apply now at the link in our bio.
Watch Nodules 🪨: https://youtu.be/1jcmfjDtS1Q?si=us5JLqcO2OKidW3c
Screen Observer 🟥: /
#ScienceCommunication #FilmMaking #Film #DCEFF
Saturday, March 21, 2pm: Catch a free screening of 2026 Stone Award Winner OBSERVER at the National Academy of Sciences!
Filmmaker Ian Cheney (KING CORN) embarks on an experiment to bring keen-eyed observers to a range of locations around the world and ask them to describe what they see. What unfolds is a deep exploration and celebration of the power of observation: what happens when you find new ways to sense and perceive the world around you?
Followed by a conversation with with producer Sarah Goodwin and film subject Dallas Hudson, moderated by @natbco .
🎬 Join us at @thenasciences for a special screening of the film OBSERVER presented in partnership with @cpnas and the DC Environmental Film Festival!
This award-winning film, produced by Sarah Goodwin (one of our #scicomm award winners), invites viewers to explore and celebrate the power of observation and asks what happens when you find new ways to sense and perceive the world around you.
📅 Saturday, March 21
🕒 2:00–4:00 PM (doors open 1:30 PM)
📍 National Academy of Sciences, Washington, DC
Stay after the screening for a conversation with Sarah and film subject Dallas Hudson, moderated by Natalie Compton of the Washington Post.
The film is the winner of this year’s Flo Stone and Roger D. Stone Award for Outstanding Artistry in Filmmaking.
🎟️ RSVP at the link in our bio.
#SciComm #EnvironmentalFilm #film #DCEFF
Breakthroughs don’t start with answers. They start with imagination. ✨ Singer and artist Jewel turned NASA open science data into a sculpture of light and sound — making the invisible visceral, and the abstract felt. Keynote with Jewel at the NAS & online → Wednesday, March 25 at 7 PM ET. Link in bio to register!
Image: Jewel’s sculptural installation, Seven Sisters, which is driven by astronomical data from the Pleiades star grouping. Radiation patterns from each star, captured by the Kepler telescope’s extended mission, determine the fluctuations of light and sound.
Photo: Matthew Takes.
#SpaceScienceWeek #ScienceForAll #SciArt #CPNAS #Jewel
Enjoy photos of the February 19 DC Art Science Evening Rendezvous looking at the role of art, design, and imagination in the human exploration of Mars.
Thanks to all who joined us for this fun evening!
Photos by Bruce Guthrie and Alana Quinn.
Today is #PlutoDay! You won’t find a symbol representing Pluto in the Great Hall dome because the NAS Building dates from 1924 and Pluto was discovered on February 18th, 1930. Pluto was later reclassified as a dwarf planet, so we were right all along!
More ➡️ On February 18th, 1930, young astronomer Clyde Tombaugh spotted a faint moving object in images taken at the Lowell Observatory in Arizona — a find that would captivate the world and be officially named Pluto just months later. For 76 years, Pluto held its title as the ninth planet in our solar system, until the International Astronomical Union reclassified it as a “dwarf planet” in 2006 — a decision that still sparks spirited debate among space enthusiasts. Pluto Day is a chance to celebrate curiosity, discovery, and the ever-evolving nature of science, and to give a little love to the solar system’s most famous underdog.
#CPNAS #SciArt #nationalacademyofsciences
Join us Thursday, Feb. 19, from 6:30 p.m. – 9 p.m. in the Fred Kavli Auditorium at the NAS, for a D.C. Art Science Evening Rendezvous exploring the role of imagination in journeys beyond Earth. A cross-disciplinary panel will examine how imaginative thinking shapes research, drives technological innovation, and helps us envision human life on Mars. Link in bio to register. ⬆️
You’ll hear from Pascal Lee, a planetary scientist and artist who created this marvelous painting.
🎨 Image: Pascal Lee, Exploring Mars, Homage (and Update) to Chesley Bonestell’s “Exploring Mars” (1956), 2021, oil on board, 12 x 24 inches.
🚀 More about the painting: In 1956, space artist Chesley Bonestell painted a visionary scene of astronauts exploring the Martian surface for Wernher von Braun and Willy Ley’s book The Exploration of Mars. Sixty-five years later, planetary scientist Pascal Lee reimagines that iconic moment with updated knowledge of Mars and new concepts for human exploration.
Lee’s tribute to Bonestell reflects decades of field research with the Haughton-Mars Project on Devon Island in the High Arctic, where scientists test Mars exploration technologies in one of Earth’s most Mars-like environments. The spacecraft design draws inspiration from SpaceX’s Starship, while surface operations concepts emerge from NASA field campaigns and collaborative research with the Mars Institute, SETI Institute, and multiple space agencies.
A planetary scientist, Arctic expedition leader, and lifelong artist, Lee bridges scientific research and visual imagination—honoring Bonestell’s legacy while advancing our vision of humanity’s future on Mars.
Bonestell’s original painting, of a similar size, is in the collection of the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum.
#CPNAS #IGDC #LASERtalks
Capping off our week of awards announcements: OBSERVER, directed by Ian Cheney, is this year’s Flo Stone & Roger D. Stone Award winner! We’re excited to present this as a free screening at the National Academy of Sciences on March 21st (registration opens Tuesday).
In OBSERVER, filmmaker Ian Cheney embarks on an experiment in which he brings a series of keen-eyed observers — scientists, artists, a hunter — to a range of locations around the world, often without telling them where they are going, and asks them simply to describe what they see. What unfolds is a deep exploration and celebration of the power of observation: what happens when you find new ways to sense & perceive the world around you?
The Flo Stone & Roger D. Stone Award For Outstanding Artistry in Filmmaking was created to honor DCEFF Founder Flo Stone, as well as both Flo and Roger’s enthusiasm and passion for originality, artistry, and innovation in filmmaking.
