Artist and Composer Turn Particle Physics Into Art

Imagine turning invisible subatomic particles into paintings you can see and music you can feel. That's exactly what's happening at America's premier particle physics lab in 2026.

Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory just announced visual artist Eleftheria Lialios and composer Isaac Smith as their 2026 guest artist and composer. The duo will spend the year working alongside physicists to translate complex particle research into art anyone can experience.

Lialios brings a background in psychology, anthropology, and photography to her work. She plans to transform data from cosmic ray telescopes and particle accelerators into large-scale visual installations. "I want to gather the data, see what's interpreted from it and transfer that to a visual plane," she explained.

Smith, who holds a doctorate in music composition and a background in mathematics, will focus on data sonification. That means turning scientific measurements into actual sound. His special interest? Neutrinos, those ghost-like particles that pass through matter without leaving a trace.

"No human has seen a neutrino or a proton," Smith said. "We detect the remnants or traces of these things. Music lets you dig into the emotional or spiritual content of that abstraction."

The annual program connects artists with the scientists and engineers who study the universe at its smallest scales. Fermilab's massive detectors translate unseeable particles into data that researchers interpret through graphs and charts. But creative minds can present this same information in ways that resonate on a human level.

Smith plans to start by building relationships with the scientists themselves. He wants to understand not just their data, but their excitement and curiosity. "I aim to understand what they're doing and what they're excited about," he said.

Why This Inspires

This collaboration shows that art and science aren't opposing forces. They're two different languages describing the same amazing universe. When particle physicists discover something new about reality, most of us can't access it through equations alone. But transform that discovery into a painting or a symphony, and suddenly we're all invited into the wonder.

Georgia Schwender, Fermilab's visual arts coordinator, put it perfectly: "Our artists and guest composers create works rooted in science that inspire and provoke thought."

Both artists will work throughout 2026, and the public will experience their finished works in Fermilab's Wilson Hall later in the year.