Week 6: BioTech + Art

BioTech involves the manipulation of the body for artistic and scientific purposes. This topic is both fascinating and controversial given its nature. A lot of moral questions are raised in the process of creating art out of BioTech, and it’s hard to draw the boundaries between what is moral and what is immoral. 

Kathy High's rats

I personally believe that life is indeed a valid expressive medium, and arts involving life helps us look at ourselves and the world we live in from so many different perspectives. For example, the project HLA-B27 by visual artist Kathy High involves some retired rats from pharmaceutical research and how the artist came to become intimate with them. Rats, despite their appearance, are actually very close relatives to human in terms of their DNA construction. Thus, rats are widely used in labs to test drugs. Kathy High’s project reminds us that while we do cruel experiments on rats, they are still life forms close to us and should be respected.

Stelarc with his third ear

However, I think there are times when the experimentation of art with bioTech went to far. Stelarc, an Australian performance artist, had a third ear implanted on his arm. While he claims that it is “generating that anxiety, that uncertainty and that ambivalence and reaction that makes the body re-examine the world”, I personally only found the project too aggressive and not making much sense to me. Should we harm our own body to do such exploration? What risks can we take when we make art using BioTech?  I think these are the questions artists should ponder before they make BioArt. 

BioArt is emerging with the improvement of technology

Sources

McCafferty, Georgia. “The Man with an Ear on His Arm” CNN. N.p., Oct 2012.

High, Kathy. “Embracing Animal” Kathy High. N.p., Web. April. 2004.

High, Kathy. “HLA-B27” Kathy High. N.p., Web. Oct 2008.

Vesna, Victoria. “BioTech and Art: Part 5.” YouTube. YouTube, n.d. Web. 25 Dec. 2012.

Wong, Virgil. “Art Exhibited in Galleries and Museums around the World.” Art. N.p., 2012. Web. 26 Oct. 2012.