Multimodal art–science ensembles: tracking the shift from a scientific data graph into wearable hand-loomed beadwork

This article investigates what happens when a two-dimensional scientific data visualization is translated into a tactile, wearable object, and how that translation alters the meaning-making potential of science communication. The authors present a case study in which a genetic admixture chart mapping the diversity of African populations is transformed into hand-loomed beadwork by the Marigold cooperative (Bulawayo, Zimbabwe), in collaboration with scientists at the Sydney Brenner Institute for Molecular Bioscience (Wits University, South Africa). Using a multimodal and transmodal framework with a focus on touch, tangibility and materiality, the article tracks sequential shifts from PDF chart to pixellated pattern to beadwork, and finally to exhibition ensembles that orchestrate visual, spatial and linguistic modes. The authors argue that the hand-made, bodily and social presence embedded in beadwork provides new perspectives on connections between data and people, contributing to engagement with both science and art. The ensembles further mediate access by enabling different entry points, enriching interpretation. They show how these modal transitions modulate genre and affect, thickening the communicative affordances of the original scientific visualization, and in turn the meaning-potential of the beadwork.