Creativity in Research and Engagement: Making, Sharing and Storytelling
By Naomi, on 3 July 2025
Guest post by Sheetal Saujani, Citizen Science Coordinator in the Office for Open Science & Scholarship
At the Creativity in Research and Engagement session during the 2025 Open Science and Scholarship Festival, we invited participants to ask a simple question: what if we looked at research and engagement through the lens of creativity?
Together, we explored how creative approaches can unlock new possibilities across research, public engagement, and community participation. Through talks, discussions, and hands-on activities, we discussed visual thinking, storytelling, and participatory methods – tools that help us rethink how we work and connect with others.
Why creativity?
Whether it’s communicating complex science through visual storytelling, turning data into art, or reimagining who gets to ask the research questions in the first place, creative approaches help break down barriers and make research more inclusive and impactful.
Sketchnoting
We began by learning a new skill – sketchnoting – a quick, visual way of capturing ideas with shapes, symbols, diagrams, and keywords rather than full sentences. It’s not about being artistic; it’s about clarity and connection. As we reminded participants “Anyone can draw!”
Throughout the session, it became clear that creativity isn’t about perfection – it’s about connection, experimentation, and finding new ways to involve and inspire others in our work.
Three UCL speakers then shared how they’ve used creative methods in their research and engagement work.
Angharad Green – Turning genomic data into art
Angharad Green, Senior Research Data Steward at UCL’s Advanced Research Computing Centre, shared her work on the evolution of Streptococcus pneumoniae (the bacteria behind pneumonia and meningitis) using genomic data and experimental evolution.
What made her talk stand out was the way she visualised complex data. Using vibrant Muller plots to track changes in bacterial populations over time, she transformed dense genomic information into something accessible and visually compelling. She also ensured the visuals were accessible to people with colour blindness.
The images were so impactful that they earned a place on the cover of Infection Control & Hospital Epidemiology. Angharad’s work is a powerful example of how creative design can not only improve research communication and uncover patterns that might otherwise go unnoticed, but also proves that data can double as art and that science can be both rigorous and imaginative.
“As I looked at the Muller plots,” she said, “I started to see other changes I hadn’t noticed – how one mutation would trigger another.”
Katharine Round – Ghost Town and the art of the undirected lens
Katharine Round, a filmmaker and Lecturer in Ethnographic and Documentary Film in UCL’s Department of Anthropology presented Ghost Town, set in the tsunami-struck city of Kamaishi, Japan. Local taxi drivers reported picking up passengers who then vanished – ghosts, perhaps, or expressions of unresolved grief.
Katharine explored memory, myth, and trauma using a unique method: fixed cameras installed inside taxis, with no filmmaker present. This “abandoned camera” approach created a space that felt intimate and undirected, like a moving confessional booth, allowing deeply personal stories to surface.
By simply asking, “Has anything happened to you since the tsunami that you’ve never spoken about?” the project uncovered raw, unstructured truths, stories that traditional interviews might never reach.
Katharine’s work reminds us that storytelling can be an evocative form of research. By using creative, non-linear methods, she uncovered stories that traditional data collection approaches might have missed. Sometimes, the most powerful insights come when the researcher steps back, listens, and lets the story unfold on its own.
Joseph Cook – Co-creation and creativity in Citizen Science
Joseph Cook leads the UCL Citizen Science Academy at the UCL Institute for Global Prosperity.
He shared how the Academy trains and supports community members to become co-researchers in community projects that matter to them, often co-designed with local councils on topics like health, prosperity, and wellbeing.
Joseph shared a range of inspiring creative work:
- Zines made by young citizen scientists in Tower Hamlets, including a research rap and reflections on life in the care system.
- A silk scarf by Aysha Ahmed, filled with symbols of home and belonging drawn from displaced communities in Camden.
- A tea towel capturing community recipes and food memories from Regent’s Park Estate, part of a project on culture and cohesion.
- Creative exhibitions such as The Architecture of Pharmacies, exploring healthcare spaces through the lens of lived experience.
Instead of asking communities to answer predefined questions, the Academy invites people to ask their own, reframing participants as experts in their own lives.
Joseph was joined by Mohammed Rahman, a citizen scientist and care leaver, awarded a UCL Citizen Science Certificate through the Academy’s ActEarly ‘Citizen Science with Care Leavers’ programme. Through his zine and audio documentary, Mohammed shared personal insights on wellbeing, support and independence showing how storytelling deepens understanding and drives change.
From thinking to making
After the talks, participants reflected and got creative. They explored evaluation methods like the “4Ls” (Liked, Learned, Lacked, Longed For) and discussed embedding co-design throughout projects, including evaluation, and why it’s vital to involve communities from the start.
Participants made badges, sketchnoted their reflections, and took on a “Zine in 15 Minutes” challenge, contributing to a collective zine on creativity and community.
Final reflections
Creativity isn’t an add-on – it’s essential. It helps us ask better questions, involve more people, and communicate in ways that resonate. Methods like sketchnoting, visual metaphors, zine-making, and creative media open research and engagement to a wider range of voices and experiences.
Creative work doesn’t need to be academic papers – it can be a rap, a tea towel, or a short film. Creativity sparks insight, supports co-creation, and builds meaningful connection.
Whether through drawing, storytelling, or simply asking different questions, we must continue making space for creativity – in our projects and institutions.
Find out more
- Sketchnoting for Citizen Science – European Citizen Science Association (ECSA) webinar (YouTube)
- Award-winning journal cover featuring Angharad’s visuals. Questions? Contact: Angharad.green@ucl.ac.uk
- Discover the UCL Citizen Science Academy projects
- Explore citizen scientist zines on Issuu.
- For more on Ghost Town or updates, contact Katharine Round: k.round@ucl.ac.uk
Get involved!
The UCL Office for Open Science and Scholarship invites you to contribute to the open science and scholarship movement. Stay connected for updates, events, and opportunities. Follow us on Bluesky, and join our mailing list to be part of the conversation!