Clone the Clone
Genetologic Research 26/11/2007 22:25
Mark Dion
Lab Bench, 2006
photo: D. Rijper
Mark Dion conducts large-scale projects in which he questions the role of specialistsfrom archaeologists to ethnologists, from historians to art curators. He questions the classification systems placed on objects by professionals and institutions and invites viewers of his work to be an active audience. Lab Bench is Mark Dion’s perfect imitation or ‘clone’ of the biotechnology laboratory Hubrecht in Utrecht. Could it be used to clone cells? Did he clone a cloning lab? That would be brilliant!
A fictive line separates the bench and literary copies everything form the other ‘original’ side, including personal family photo’s in the open drawer and a left over toast on the table with one bite missing. The work was part of the exhibition Genesis - Life at the end of the information age in the Centraal Museum Utrecht (14/04 - 12/08/2007).
Copy a Copy
Genetologic Research 25/11/2007 15:54
Andy Warhol
Brillo Boxes, 1969
The Moderna Museet, Stockholm’s modern art museum, has determined that six Andy Warhol Brillo boxes in its collection are fakes. They were turned out by carpenters three years after Warhol’s death, at the request of the late Pontus Hulten, the Museum’s famous director in the 1960s, who needed them to promote a show in Russia in 1990. The Museum now claims that Hulten later sold some of the boxes with the false claim that they had been made in 1968 and donated several to the Museum.
The irony in the row is that Warhol himself questioned the idea of “original” art - choosing everyday items as subjects and producing thousands of prints of the same work. Andy Warhol often left assistants to “mass produce” many of his most famous pictures, among them images of the Campbell soup tin.
The Andy Warhol Authentication Board has decreed that only artworks the artist was directly involved in producing can be considered a Warhol original, according to reports in the Independent on Sunday and Sunday Telegraph in the UK.
Andy Warhol paintings are among the most prized 20th Century artworks. A screenprint of Campbell’s soup tin fetched £10m at an auction, while a Marilyn Monroe picture from 1967 reached £11m at auction in 1998. Was it really real?
Isn’t life a series of images that change as they repeat themselves?
- Andy Warhol -
The Art of Cloning
Genetologic Research 22/11/2007 12:56
Boryana D Rossa
Clone, 1997
CALResCo
A clone is an identical copy, and thus may be thought to be perfectly predictable (after all we understand the original), but this is a big error. The world is not static but dynamic and thus evolution must be taken into account. Each organism occupies a different space and thus will enjoy different experiences. These lead to changes in the organism itself, chemical, electrical, valuational, etc. which will very rapidly diverge the behaviours of clones (as we see from studies of identical twins). Despite the human desire for predictabilty, this chaos driven divergence is endemic to our coevolutionary world and makes the simplistic predictions of the perpetrators of these ‘improvements’ nonsensical.
In complex systems, plans are simply delusions…
CALResCo promotes free world-wide education about Complex Systems
The Art of Cloning
Genetologic Research 21/11/2007 20:57
Boryana D Rossa
Clone, 1997
CALResCo
A clone is an identical copy, and thus may be thought to be perfectly predictable (after all we understand the original), but this is a big error. The world is not static but dynamic and thus evolution must be taken into account. Each organism occupies a different space and thus will enjoy different experiences. These lead to changes in the organism itself, chemical, electrical, valuational, etc. which will very rapidly diverge the behaviours of clones (as we see from studies of identical twins). Despite the human desire for predictabilty, this chaos driven divergence is endemic to our coevolutionary world and makes the simplistic predictions of the perpetrators of these ‘improvements’ nonsensical.
In complex systems, plans are simply delusions…
CALResCo promotes free world-wide education about Complex Systems
Cloning Art
Genetologic Research 20/11/2007 17:21
Julie Baroh’s Clone, from Alpha, was an interesting piece rendered in colored pencil that showed two soldiers staring at each other, not sure what to make of one another. Over time, it became one of the more recognizable Magic pieces. Carl Critchlow reiterpreted it (using paint) for the reprint of Clone in Onslaught. Same beach, same clothes, same soldiers, except they now brandish crossbows and look slightly more irritated. A fine homage to the original.
Another well-know piece of art, Morphling by rk post, is similar in appearance to Clone, even though it isn’t a “copy” card per se. Morphling was actually designed to be a sort of “rules-friendly” Clone - a card that could simulate other creatures without actually copying them. That’s why the art is similar to Clone’s.
Two other blue cards use mirror image art: Quinton Hoover’s Vesuvan Doppelganger from Alpha (Clone’s big sister), and it’s mild-mannered descendent, Greg Staples’ Shifty Doppelganger from Odyssey.
Body Double
Genetologic Research 13/11/2007 19:09
BEAVERTON, Oregon (CNN) — Oregon researchers say they have cloned a monkey by splitting an early-stage embryo and implanting the pieces into mother animals.
The technique has so far produced only one living monkey, a bright-eyed rhesus macaque female named Tetra, now 4 months old.
Tetra the monkey is different from Dolly the sheep, which was produced by Scientists at Scotland’s Roslin Institute using a process called nuclear transfer — taking the nucleus out of an adult cell and using it to reprogram an unfertilized egg.
Some scientists argue that animals like Dolly are not 100 percent clones because they have genetic material both from the adult cell they were taken from, and from the egg that is hollowed out to make the clone. Tetra was produced by a technique called “embryo splitting.” Here’s how it works:
* An egg from a mother and sperm from a father are used to create a fertilized egg.
* After the embryo grows into eight cells, researchers split it into four identical embryos, each consisting of just two cells.
* The four embryos are then implanted into surrogate mothers. Schatten said that in effect, a single embryo becomes four embryos, all genetically identical.
In the case of their experiment, three of the embryos didn’t survive. The fourth, Tetra, was born 157 days later. Her name means “one of four.” Tetra isn’t the first monkey to be cloned, but she is the first using the embryo-splitting technique. More are on the way.
Body Double
Genetologic Research 13/11/2007 19:09
BEAVERTON, Oregon (CNN) — Oregon researchers say they have cloned a monkey by splitting an early-stage embryo and implanting the pieces into mother animals.
The technique has so far produced only one living monkey, a bright-eyed rhesus macaque female named Tetra, now 4 months old.
Tetra the monkey is different from Dolly the sheep, which was produced by Scientists at Scotland’s Roslin Institute using a process called nuclear transfer — taking the nucleus out of an adult cell and using it to reprogram an unfertilized egg.
Some scientists argue that animals like Dolly are not 100 percent clones because they have genetic material both from the adult cell they were taken from, and from the egg that is hollowed out to make the clone. Tetra was produced by a technique called “embryo splitting.” Here’s how it works:
* An egg from a mother and sperm from a father are used to create a fertilized egg.
* After the embryo grows into eight cells, researchers split it into four identical embryos, each consisting of just two cells.
* The four embryos are then implanted into surrogate mothers. Schatten said that in effect, a single embryo becomes four embryos, all genetically identical.
In the case of their experiment, three of the embryos didn’t survive. The fourth, Tetra, was born 157 days later. Her name means “one of four.” Tetra isn’t the first monkey to be cloned, but she is the first using the embryo-splitting technique. More are on the way.
Semi-Living Food
Genetologic Research 07/11/2007 19:19
Oron Catts and Ionat Zurr
Semi-Living Food: Disembodied Cuisine
Another way of treating living systems is by consuming them as food. Throughout history many humans have practiced some kind of division among living entities which are categorized as food or others (such as pets, ornaments, work etc.). These divisions are not always clear, and we must practice some kind of hypocrisy in order to be able to love and respect living things as well as to eat them.
Our latest project titled Disembodied Cuisine will be shown in an international biological art exhibition Lart Biotech in Nantes, France March 2003. In the Disembodied Cuisine we will attempt to grow frog skeletal muscle over biopolymer for potential food consumption. A biopsy will be taken from an animal which will continue to live and be displayed in the gallery along side the growing steak. This installation will culminate in a feast. The idea and research into this project began in Harvard in 2000. The first steak we have grown was made out of pre-natal sheep cells (skeletal muscle). We used cells harvested as part of research into tissue engineering techniques in utero. The steak was grown from an animal that was not yet born.
This piece deals with one of the most common zones of interaction between humans and other living systems and will probe the apparent uneasiness people feel when someone messes with their food. Here the relationships with the Semi-Living are that of consumption and exploitation however, it is important to note that it is about victimless meat consumption. As the cells from the biopsy proliferate the steak in vitro continues to grow and expand, while the source, the animal from which the cells were taken, is healing. Potentially this work presents a future in which there will be meat (or protein rich food) for vegetarians and the killing and suffering of animals destined for food consumption will be reduced. Furthermore, ecological and economical problems associated with the food industry (hence, growing grains to feed the animals and keeping them in basic conditions) can be reduced dramatically. However, by making our food a new class of object/being a Semi-Living we are risking of making the Semi-Living the new class for exploitation.
Ian Sample, science correspondent of The Guardian
It is the ultimate conundrum for vegetarians who think that meat is murder: a revolution in processed food that will see fresh meat grown from animal cells without a single cow, sheep or pig being killed. Researchers have published details in a biotechnology journal describing a new technique which they hailed as the answer to the world’s food shortage. Lumps of meat would be cultured in laboratory vats rather than carved from livestock reared on a farm.
Scientists have adapted the cutting-edge medical technique of tissue engineering, where individual cells are multiplied into whole tissues, and applied them to food production. “With a single cell, you could theoretically produce the world’s annual meat supply,” said Jason Matheny, an agricultural scientist at the University of Maryland.
The idea of doing away with traditional livestock and growing steaks from scratch dates back at least 70 years. In a horizon-scanning essay from 1932, Winston Churchill said: “Fifty years hence we shall escape the absurdity of growing a whole chicken in order to eat the breast or wing by growing these parts separately under a suitable medium.” Several decades too late, Churchill’s vision finally looks set to become a reality.
Lab-raised steaks will be off the menu for some time though. Scientists believe that while tissue engineering is advanced enough to grow bland, homogeneous meat, tasty and textured cuts will have to wait.
Eslöv Meteorite
Genetologic Research 03/11/2007 12:43
meteor impact at 06.41 am
In the early morning of the 3rd of november 2007 a meteor hit Eslöv, known as the most boring town of Sweden. It was an unexpected event that was witnessed only by a few. The energy of the blast was estimated to be between 1 and 2 megatons of TNT and left a hole of 15 metres in diameter in a field near Eslöv. The meteorite was dug up by Maarten Vanden Eynde and put on display in front of the Medborgarhuset in the framework of the 2nd Eslöv Biennale.
meteor crater near Eslöv
Eslöv Biennale II
03/11 - 30/11/2007: Medborgarhuset, Eslöv, Sweden
The 2007 Biennale is a wide exhibition that offers a regional and national sample of the art of today with international flavours. The elements of the Biennale is like a sweep through the art-world with everything from visual art to sound-art, conceptualism and performance. The location for the Biennale is part of the experience. Medborgarhuset (Civic Hall) has flourished during the last year and is building a reputation as a centre of events. In architectural circles the Civic Hall in Eslöv is known as the most ambitious building in Sweden in the post-war period. It was 1947 when the young, newly-qualified architect Hans Asplund´s proposal won the competition to design Eslöv´s Civic Hall, which was built and completed in 1957. At the same time he build the United Nations building in New York for which he used many similar materials.
Victimless Leather Jacket
Genetologic Research 26/10/2007 18:27
Oron Catts and Ionat Zurr
Victimless Leather- A Prototype of Stitch-less Jacket grown in a Technoscientific “Body”
Humans, the naked/nude apes, have been covering their fragile bodies/skins to protect themselves from the external environment. This humble act for survival has developed into a complex social ritual which transformed the concept of a Garment into an evocative object that cannot be taken on its face value. Garment became an expressive tool to project one’s identity, social class, political stand and so on. Garments are humans’ fabrication and can be explored as a tangible example of humans’ treatment of the Other.
By growing Victimless Leather, the Tissue Culture & Art (TC&A) Project is further problematising the concept of garment by making it Semi-Living. The Victimless Leather is grown out of immortalised cell lines which cultured and form a living layer of tissue supported by a biodegradable polymer matrix in a form of miniature stich-less coat like shape. The Victimless Leather project concerns with growing living tissue into a leather like material.
This artistic grown garment will confront people with the moral implications of wearing parts of dead animals for protective and aesthetic reasons and will further confront notions of relationships with living systems manipulated or otherwise. An actualized possibility of wearing leather’ without killing an animal is offered as a starting point for cultural discussion.
Our intention is not to provide yet another consumer product but rather to raise questions about our exploitation of other living beings. We see our role as artists as one in which we are providing tangible example of possible futures, and research the potential affects of these new forms on our cultural perceptions of life. It is not our role to provide people with goods for their daily use. We would like our work to be seen in this cultural context, and not in a commercial context.
As part of the TC&A project we are artistically exploring and provoking notions relating to human conduct with other living systems, or to the Other. This particular project will deconstruct our cultural meaning of clothes as a second skin by materialsing it and displaying it as an art object.
This piece also presents an ambiguous and somewhat ironic take into the technological price our society will need to pay for achieving a victimless utopia.
The research and development of Victimless Leather has been conducted in SymbioticA: the Art and Science Collaborative Research Laboratory, School of Anatomy and Human Biology at the University of Western Australia and in consultation with Professor Arunasalam Dharmarajan from the School of Anatomy and Human Biology as well as Verigen, a Perth based company that specializes in tissue engineered cartilage for clinical applications. The State of Western Australia has made an investment in this project through ArtsWA in Association with the Lotteries Commission.
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