DataBase
2002 | Batagianni Gallery | Athens, Greece
2002 | Studios 1| Center for Contemporary Art | Thessaloniki, Greece
2002 | Studios 1| Center for Contemporary Art | Thessaloniki, Greece
D a t a B a s e A n d I : G e n e s F u l l C i r c l e *
The fairground
One day in the studio I hid a bulb of fluorescent light behind a semi-transparent membrane of acrylic resin. A set of ideas was activated by this gesture. They condensed the visual and cognitive data that I had accumulated after three years of intense reading and of surfing on the net in the areas of biotechnology and genetics. It was the time when the HGP was announced broadly through every TV station, suggesting the turmoil of ideas that were to be aroused concerning human identity. Up until then, artworks or critical texts that dealt with ideas of the "new identity", "reshuffling the self" etc. intrigued me. In front of the new horizon they seemed weak if they focused on the cosmetic surgery interventions or probably on a set of behavioral traits. Genetic interventions, suggested by the HGP, is a different story. A war of biotechnological opinions is on its way and the horizon between reality and possibility of alteration vanishes forever.
Looking at the inside of the body on the screen is like being on a fairground for visual artists. The body is all there, wide open to suggestions, alterations and planned interventions. Its mystery is replaced by archives of digital data. Its familiarity - we dwell in the body after all - is transformed into numerals and graphs. In the virtual cortex my everlasting genes coexist with the genes of every other human being on the planet. A new aspect of the body that challenges interaction, change and fluidity is on its way. And yet, this primeval soup, the gene pool, is there, available to everybody, only because technology permits it. Electronic microscopes and software have done the job.
The lab
I started gathering visual and theoretical data, graphs and maps. When the "gene pool" was complete, I put into practice a mechanism of different studio works that ended up to the installation "DataBase (and I suspended)". What I did was simple. I created different transparent surfaces that simulated the visual data from the computer and added �accidental� alterations: cells in the process of multiplication, neurons in the process of firing information through their synaptic gaps, cells in mutation, gene graphs, photos, etc. After six months I stopped this indexing. I was now surrounded by three- dimensional models, hybrids of the inside of the body in a size that practically covered the whole surface of my rather big studio. There I was, in the middle of a symbolic and magnified world, a world that I would never have accessed had it not been for cyberspace.
The next move was to compile the work in a single stack and light it from within. Compilation added new meanings since it created an apocalyptic and yet mysterious layering of different functions. Every single element of the work, either painted surface or light bulb was interacting with the rest. When one little bulb was moved an inch to the right or to the left, the system changed dramatically. Endless fluidity, reckless intervention, I thought. I installed the system on the floor and placed some of its parts on the walls hanging here and there. The studio looked like a lab. Walking through the enlightened membranes the scale of my body changed. The human dimension was overemphasized as if I was embodied behind the screen, in this mysterious world full of suggestions, expressed fears and errors. The turmoil of all those months of work melted, in the end, into a single virtual-visual experience. Arbitrariness and the accidental, the amount of risk and experimentation that are so familiar to painters are all inherent into this symbolic lab. The lab is a fairground where everything is possible. This frenzy of accumulating data in the cyber archives made it real. I reformed digital data into a world of atoms.
The replicator
Then the work was photographed and was placed on the site. I was astounded by its digital version. I guess that my reaction before its new visual appearance was similar to that of a scientist who has failed to accomplish an experiment. In the past I had reformed dozens of constructions and paintings into digital data. Without exception, they retained most of their traits on the computer. Behind the screen they all looked like "artworks in an artist's site" - but not this one. The work was practically devoured by the screen and I thought I was at point zero, but not quite. It is back in the space where it belongs and there it imploded, I reckoned . This new virtual experience was absolutely theatrical. The work was intangible and diffused again. All references to its actual materiality were devaluated. Its spatial characteristics disappeared behind the screen. Its tactile traits were lost without a hint that they had ever existed. At the same time an unforeseen virtual space opened up. It is a dynamic space that suggests interaction, the sense of the provisional, contradictory possibilities. The close-ups of the work -in reference to their digital origins- toy with a scientific imagery which stretches out the fear of change, careless intervention and experimental risk. Where am I, I wondered, having the double experience that I walked through and around the work, fantasizing about it at the same time in front of the screen. Well, here I am , through this work- a symbolic replicator - , interconnected in a fluid manner between my digital self and that of the atoms. The viewers of the work's digital reality interact with it when they sit in front of their computers through their "situated vision". The viewers of the work's reality of atoms interact with it in full synesthesia when they encounter it in the gallery.
"The dissolution of TV into life, the dissolution of life into TV"... has been said. I had gone full circle.
____________________________________
Effie Halivopoulou, May 2001
*This text is included in the catalogue SEAFAIR: Society and Genomic Culture, June 2001, Center for Contemporary Arts, Skopje.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
What is so sexy about the biological today? Is artistic product as fickle as our hollow markets? Worse still, is artistic product just an aid in the panic diversion of cash flows?
V i v a V i v o ! L i v i n g A r t i s D e a d
Is art just another way to lure press coverage away from our mismanaged Computer World? Are the technologies of Cloning, Transgenics and Genomics just charismatic suck-holes seducing faux-independent art exploration? Are our artists slaves to the rhythm of the latest big boom/bust bubble, the biotechnological fad market? I would say yes, often yes. Sometimes bioart is a gateway drug, the road to harder drugs, war, creative accounting, fraud and dashed dreams. Some artists are like unwitting pimps and pushers, hooking dupes of waning cultural capital on the next 'born to lose' high-risk venture.
Reservoirs:
One would hope that, beyond cultural hypnosis, vast reservoirs of international imaginations do flourish. One would hope that there are better reasons to scope out undulating living abstractions than the propping up of market schemes. Is it naïve to think that Aesthetes are not all just echoes of capital-intensive trends? Is it politically incorrect to dream that it might be possible to hunt beauty for pleasure… for pleasure without apology? Broad, heterogeneous swaths of ideation course outside of the status quo. This prophetic, often dystopic, expressive and unregulated meme-surplus seduces some engineers. The glut of creative fantasy is a gold mine and a minefield. From the excess of possibilities comes the impetus for actuated technologies. Ahhh, refinement, so pleasurable and deadly.
Meme Proteomics:
By reading this text or any creative presentation, you are incorporating it into your fleshy repertoire. During a focused semiotic transmission, more than thoughts change hands. Basic physiology has been altered. Protein production is over and under regulated by intellectually reactive metabolites. Pride of knowledge, gullible acceptance, the deviant chuckle, these are not thoughts without physicality. This page is a transgenic vector, contagious, infective. Your children will have more or less bushy eyebrows if you continue reading high theory. You may be too detached to breed! This is intergenerational selection, grammatological eugenics. Beads of sweat or consternation drip from your entity-ness.
Humanism:
The feeling of being a morally superior, detached observer is a practice for scientist and art appreciator alike. The major difference is the goal of the search. Scientists search for uniformity and rule based logic. Art appreciators search for beauty, irony or even iconoclasm. They both search as spectators. They both gravitate towards essentialism. They both are Playing God and getting very human endorphin/serotonin rewards for this radical detachment. Ours is a futile quest to commandeer universalism. Natural law mocks the reductionist. Artists mock our human ego to its foundation but only for the brain chemistry that comes with elitist satisfaction. Feigning anthropocentric distance, posthumans practice fluidity of self-definition. We are the studying machines made of meat, worms on two feet, bacterial bioreactors, and overgrown drosophila; there is no human. Certainly there is no superior spectacularity of essential humanity. We love dross and sculpt to refine our aesthetics. These days that includes sculpting our kindred. We are breeding for pleasure in a world of hurt. Our children will be posthuman but not superhuman. Bodily enhancement suffers the same pangs as other aesthetic qualms... passe-ism includes all versions of human being. And we are proud not to be proud.
Masturbation:
What excites you below the belt? What makes you wet and swollen with lust? These are the sites of erotic interchange. These are the acts that make you cum. That is life. That is pleasure, even diabolical pleasure. Study lust. Lust drives biotech: Fantastic gender trouble. Fantastic taboo. Fantastic victimization. Fantastic biomorphic somnambulism. Fantastic reproduction. Fantastic creations. These technologies are actual, eroticised and semi-accepted cultural practice. Our children are children of technolust. Jacking online into the spermbank of antiquated morphology, this is tomorrows breed.
Usenet Heredity:
Reason is equal to human sacrifice, a huge fad based on cliques of thin air. Every protocol creates taboo. Every culture is a cult becoming massified. What is screened out is an anarchic void created specifically to stabilize what is screened for. Why sidewalks? Why toenail clippers? How do these architectures ensure the homeless? Are you off the locus? We build our foundations on normalized psychosis which doubles as a cohesive monument to everyday stasis. Fetish monomania is a precursor to many of our most specific cultural norms. USENET (www.guba.com) is our best guide to daily fragmentation. The uncensored imagebank of 'what's worth scanning' is better than the Louvre. The varieties of monomania are our best next world recipes. Fragments of beauty are all in the eye of the polymaniac as beholder. This is culture, ranging from banality to beastiality and back. Usenet is the birthplace of our future bio-cultural norms.
Artificial Omnipotence:
The exploration of life is not predicated on moral grounds. Morality, or the artifice of benevolence, emanates from a lack of life experiences. On the same note, objectivist investigation is the money side of prostitution. We artists and scientists should play god. We invented the concept of a holy spectator and then succumbed to denial of our invention. If no one is watching, let us be the voyeurs and exhibitionists in the great show of revealing nature. But before we start again, let's throw away beauty and reason. Let's see if it's possible to explore without some kind of artifice, without the gods of logic or joy. Surely the combination of creative lust and technical prowess has led us only to the realization of autoerotic fantasies: Veil after veil lifts, in slippery sheens of translucent tissue. The human genome project, new reproductive technologies, trans-species chimeras, breast milk pharmacies; we are our own tormented mirrors. The hidden will be revealed, fact-by-fact, corpuscle-by-corpuscle. Eventually, it is hoped by all erect explorers, Nature will lay open, legs in the air. Or for the more brutally honest, legs bound open in universal stirrups, screaming and heaving under the heavy-handed methods of investigation. All these novel explorations are fantastically pornographic but who is watching. She is We, biting and bitten, laid bare and scoped thoroughly. The original fantasies are maligned by concepts of beauty and reason. The present fantasies are maligned by visions of purchase power (feigned utility.) Perhaps these concepts have run their course? Perhaps they are inhibitory? Is there an omnipotent atheism that dos not lay claim to beauty, use-value, reason or wealth? Ask a sexworker. Who plays?
Becoming Alive:
Sexwork may explain why so many of the biophilic arts are tornadoes of abstract undulation. The animal magnetic swarms in colorfields of breathing swimming anarchy. Self-organizing patterns mingle in every corpuscle, every barnacle, every wallet and every insignificant schmutz. There may be no reason, there may be no rhyme, but we, as organisms, are implicated. We are part of the macrocosm and the microcosm. No hornet's nest of taxonomy can stop our sprouting morass. And, there is nothing like the abstract time travel of magnification to prove how foreign and indescribable a universe we live in. Our universe which we try to buy and sell. Our universe that mocks control.
Dionysian Phlegma:
Let's celebrate our temporary passage through the vast unknown. Let's celebrate the insignificance of our petty reasoning. Let's celebrate the beauty of another world, one much like our own but without the impediment of faux recognition. The novelty of not knowing and the freedom of aesthetic-less bliss conjoin to make solid the unreal the lost concept of admitting inexperience. Concepts are like tethers, sloughed nerves, responsiveness derailed. Your brain is a sensual, wet organ not a bodiless judge. It is a giant clitoris not a super computer. Instead of imagining a YOU using your brain, surrender. Fail. Subcognition wins. Give up. Give up. Let it sweep you away in a spread eagle interface of ungrounded mortal nguhhh. Vital flow is transitory by its throbbing nature. Give up on poise. Give up. Fail. Unbottle your miasma. Seep...
____________________________________
Adam Zaretsky, August 2002; A.Z. is an Artist and Biology Researcher centered in Woodstock, New York. This text was written on the occasion of exhibitions "DataBase" at Batagianni Gallery, Athens, 2002.
G l o s s a r y
Altered States, Modified Words
Mεταλλαγμένες καταστάσεις, τροποποιημένες λέξεις
A - Α
Apostrophes - Απόστροφοι
Architectural Ones (Units) and Zeros - Αρχιτεκτονικές Μονάδες και Μηδενικά
Abiochemistry memento mori - Ανόργανο νεκρικό ενθύμιο
B - B
Basoplasm Running Through - Bασεόφιλο ρέον πρωτόπλασμα
Βacchanalia in Body Setting - Βακχική γιορτή σε σωματικό σκηνικό
Bio-biscuits and Circuits - Bιο-μπισκότα και δίκτυα
C - K
Cellular architecture - Κυτταρική αρχιτεκτονική
Codes and Passwords - Κώδικες και Συνθήματα
Cyclotrons Whirling in Western Landscapes - Κυκλοτρόνια που στροβιλίζονται σε δυτικά τοπία
D - Δ
DNA Blending - DNA εν συνδέσει
Dorian Ageing - Ο Dorian Gray καθώς γερνάει
Dysfunctional Void - Δυσλειτουργικό κενό
Γ - G
Geolinks - Γαιοδεσμοί
Grounding Gravitation - Γειώνοντας τη βαρύτητα
Grammolecule: Υou Get Less and Less - Γραμμομόριo: πορεία προς το ελάχιστο
Ε - Ε
Eugenic Accidents - Eυγονικά ατυχήματα
Euphoric and Serene Synapses - Eυφορικές και γαλήνιες συνάψεις
Extracapsular Stroll - Εξωκαψική περιπλάνηση
G
Genome Forests, Genome Islands - Γονιδιακά δάση, γονιδιακά νησιά
Granular City - Σπυρωτή Πόλη
Gelatin Galaxy - Ζελατινώδης γαλαξίας
Φ - F
Fancy Interzone - Φανταστική ενδοζώνη
Faust Bargaining With Mephisto - Ο Φάουστ καθώς παζαρεύει με τον Μεφιστοφελή
Frenzy in a Hazy Bloodway - Φρενίτις σε ένα θαμπό αιμοφόρο αγωγό
Η - Θ
Heatwaves and Thermaesthesia - Θερμαισθησία και κύματα κάυσωνος
Hereditary Thrombocyte Torrent - Θρομβοκυτταρικός κληρονομικός χείμαρρος
Hydrogel Shattered Structure - Θριμματισμένη υδροδιαλυτή κατασκευή
Ι - Ι
Isocellular Islands - Iσοκυτταρικές νησίδες
In-vitro Scorpio Rising - In-vitro ανατολή του Σκορπιού
Ideomotion - Iδεοκίνηση
J
Jellyfish motion - Κίνηση Μέδουσας
Junk Blood Cells - Απόβλητα αιμοσφαίρια
Juicy junctions - Χυμώδεις κόμβοι
M - M
Marmelade of Genes and a few Other Ingredients - Mαρμελάδα από Γονίδια και μερικά άλλα συστατικά
Messages and Body Mailboxes - Μηνύματα και σωματικά ταχυδρομικά κουτιά
Monochrome Set - Μονοχρωματικό σύστημα
Λ-L
Libido is a Warm Gun - H Libido είναι ένα θερμό όπλο
Logic is Fuzzy, Brain is Oozy - Η λογική είναι ασαφής, ο εγκέφαλος στάζει
Lymph Mustard - Λυμφομουστάρδα
N - Ν
Night Journey on a Transmitter - Νυχτερινό ταξίδι με νευροδιαβιβαστή
Nexus and a Neural Ketchup - Ένα πλέγμα και μια κέτσαπ από νεύρα
O - Ο
Ontology of a Inner Journey - Oντολογία ενός εσωτερικού ταξιδιού
Op-Art Body Scene - Oπ-αρτ σκηνικό σώματος
Ozone Holes Gaping - Οπές χάσκοντος όζοντος
Q
Quake transmitter - Σεισμοδιαβιβαστής
Quartz Crystal Vibrations - Δονήσεις χαλαζιακού κρυστάλλου
Quanta Soup - Κβαντοσούπα
R - P
Radiogram: Shapes and Nightmares - Ραδιογράφημα: Σχήματα και εφιάλτες
Rhythmic Molecules, Split Seconds - Ρυθμικά μόρια, τετμημμένα δευτερόλεπτα
Rift in the Gene Valley - Ρήγμα στην κοιλάδα των γονιδίων
Σ - S
Shock protein - Συγκλονιστική πρωτεϊνη
Sirop, Blood and Other Splashes - Σιρόπι, αίμα κι άλλοι παφλασμοί
Synapses' Silent Quartet - Σιωπηλό κουαρτέτο συνάψεων
T - T
Timestorm - Χρονοτρικυμία
Techno-Chromosomes - Tεχνητά χρωμοσώματα
Tattoos on Cell Surfaces - Tατουάζ σε κυταρρικές επιφάνειες
Y - Y - U
Ulterior Body Secrets - Aνομολόγητα σωματικά μυστικά
Ultra-sonic mapping - Yπερηχητική χαρτογράφηση
Undertones - Υπο-χρώσεις
P - Π
Picaresque Journey into a Bodyscape - Περιπλάνηση σε σωματικό τοπίο
Permeable Vectors in Space - Περατά ανύσματα στο διάστημα
Parody of an Imperfect Nature - Παρωδία μιας ατελούς φύσης
Χ - Χ - Ξ
X-linked, Sex-linked - Χ-συσχετισμοί, φυλετικοί συσχετισμοί
Xenobiotic Substances, Xenophobe Creatures - Ξενοβιοτικές ουσίες, ξενόφοβα πλάσματα
V
Venograms in Yellow Background - Φλεβοδιαγράμματα σε κίτρινο φόντο
Vertigo in a Vortex - Ίλιγγος σε δίνη
Viewpoint of Innerspace - Άποψη ενδοδιαστήματος
Z - Ζ
Zee and Two Zeros - Ζήτα και δύο μηδενικά
Zig-Zag Cyto-diagram - Ζιγκ-ζαγκ κυτταρικό διάγραμμα
Zoomythology - Zωομυθολογία
____________________________________
Σώτη Τριανταφύλλου - Ιούνιος 2002
Soti Triantaphyllou - June 2002
Η Σ.Τ. είναι συγγραφέας και θεωρητικός της Αμερικάνικης Ιστορίας. Ζεί στην Αθήνα και στο Παρίσι. | S.T. is a writer and an American History scholar based in Athens and Paris.
This text was written on the occasion of 2002 solo exhibitions: "DataBase", Batagianni Gallery, Athens, and "Geolinks", Zina Athanassiadou Gallery, Thessaloniki
The fairground
One day in the studio I hid a bulb of fluorescent light behind a semi-transparent membrane of acrylic resin. A set of ideas was activated by this gesture. They condensed the visual and cognitive data that I had accumulated after three years of intense reading and of surfing on the net in the areas of biotechnology and genetics. It was the time when the HGP was announced broadly through every TV station, suggesting the turmoil of ideas that were to be aroused concerning human identity. Up until then, artworks or critical texts that dealt with ideas of the "new identity", "reshuffling the self" etc. intrigued me. In front of the new horizon they seemed weak if they focused on the cosmetic surgery interventions or probably on a set of behavioral traits. Genetic interventions, suggested by the HGP, is a different story. A war of biotechnological opinions is on its way and the horizon between reality and possibility of alteration vanishes forever.
Looking at the inside of the body on the screen is like being on a fairground for visual artists. The body is all there, wide open to suggestions, alterations and planned interventions. Its mystery is replaced by archives of digital data. Its familiarity - we dwell in the body after all - is transformed into numerals and graphs. In the virtual cortex my everlasting genes coexist with the genes of every other human being on the planet. A new aspect of the body that challenges interaction, change and fluidity is on its way. And yet, this primeval soup, the gene pool, is there, available to everybody, only because technology permits it. Electronic microscopes and software have done the job.
The lab
I started gathering visual and theoretical data, graphs and maps. When the "gene pool" was complete, I put into practice a mechanism of different studio works that ended up to the installation "DataBase (and I suspended)". What I did was simple. I created different transparent surfaces that simulated the visual data from the computer and added �accidental� alterations: cells in the process of multiplication, neurons in the process of firing information through their synaptic gaps, cells in mutation, gene graphs, photos, etc. After six months I stopped this indexing. I was now surrounded by three- dimensional models, hybrids of the inside of the body in a size that practically covered the whole surface of my rather big studio. There I was, in the middle of a symbolic and magnified world, a world that I would never have accessed had it not been for cyberspace.
The next move was to compile the work in a single stack and light it from within. Compilation added new meanings since it created an apocalyptic and yet mysterious layering of different functions. Every single element of the work, either painted surface or light bulb was interacting with the rest. When one little bulb was moved an inch to the right or to the left, the system changed dramatically. Endless fluidity, reckless intervention, I thought. I installed the system on the floor and placed some of its parts on the walls hanging here and there. The studio looked like a lab. Walking through the enlightened membranes the scale of my body changed. The human dimension was overemphasized as if I was embodied behind the screen, in this mysterious world full of suggestions, expressed fears and errors. The turmoil of all those months of work melted, in the end, into a single virtual-visual experience. Arbitrariness and the accidental, the amount of risk and experimentation that are so familiar to painters are all inherent into this symbolic lab. The lab is a fairground where everything is possible. This frenzy of accumulating data in the cyber archives made it real. I reformed digital data into a world of atoms.
The replicator
Then the work was photographed and was placed on the site. I was astounded by its digital version. I guess that my reaction before its new visual appearance was similar to that of a scientist who has failed to accomplish an experiment. In the past I had reformed dozens of constructions and paintings into digital data. Without exception, they retained most of their traits on the computer. Behind the screen they all looked like "artworks in an artist's site" - but not this one. The work was practically devoured by the screen and I thought I was at point zero, but not quite. It is back in the space where it belongs and there it imploded, I reckoned . This new virtual experience was absolutely theatrical. The work was intangible and diffused again. All references to its actual materiality were devaluated. Its spatial characteristics disappeared behind the screen. Its tactile traits were lost without a hint that they had ever existed. At the same time an unforeseen virtual space opened up. It is a dynamic space that suggests interaction, the sense of the provisional, contradictory possibilities. The close-ups of the work -in reference to their digital origins- toy with a scientific imagery which stretches out the fear of change, careless intervention and experimental risk. Where am I, I wondered, having the double experience that I walked through and around the work, fantasizing about it at the same time in front of the screen. Well, here I am , through this work- a symbolic replicator - , interconnected in a fluid manner between my digital self and that of the atoms. The viewers of the work's digital reality interact with it when they sit in front of their computers through their "situated vision". The viewers of the work's reality of atoms interact with it in full synesthesia when they encounter it in the gallery.
"The dissolution of TV into life, the dissolution of life into TV"... has been said. I had gone full circle.
____________________________________
Effie Halivopoulou, May 2001
*This text is included in the catalogue SEAFAIR: Society and Genomic Culture, June 2001, Center for Contemporary Arts, Skopje.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
What is so sexy about the biological today? Is artistic product as fickle as our hollow markets? Worse still, is artistic product just an aid in the panic diversion of cash flows?
V i v a V i v o ! L i v i n g A r t i s D e a d
Is art just another way to lure press coverage away from our mismanaged Computer World? Are the technologies of Cloning, Transgenics and Genomics just charismatic suck-holes seducing faux-independent art exploration? Are our artists slaves to the rhythm of the latest big boom/bust bubble, the biotechnological fad market? I would say yes, often yes. Sometimes bioart is a gateway drug, the road to harder drugs, war, creative accounting, fraud and dashed dreams. Some artists are like unwitting pimps and pushers, hooking dupes of waning cultural capital on the next 'born to lose' high-risk venture.
Reservoirs:
One would hope that, beyond cultural hypnosis, vast reservoirs of international imaginations do flourish. One would hope that there are better reasons to scope out undulating living abstractions than the propping up of market schemes. Is it naïve to think that Aesthetes are not all just echoes of capital-intensive trends? Is it politically incorrect to dream that it might be possible to hunt beauty for pleasure… for pleasure without apology? Broad, heterogeneous swaths of ideation course outside of the status quo. This prophetic, often dystopic, expressive and unregulated meme-surplus seduces some engineers. The glut of creative fantasy is a gold mine and a minefield. From the excess of possibilities comes the impetus for actuated technologies. Ahhh, refinement, so pleasurable and deadly.
Meme Proteomics:
By reading this text or any creative presentation, you are incorporating it into your fleshy repertoire. During a focused semiotic transmission, more than thoughts change hands. Basic physiology has been altered. Protein production is over and under regulated by intellectually reactive metabolites. Pride of knowledge, gullible acceptance, the deviant chuckle, these are not thoughts without physicality. This page is a transgenic vector, contagious, infective. Your children will have more or less bushy eyebrows if you continue reading high theory. You may be too detached to breed! This is intergenerational selection, grammatological eugenics. Beads of sweat or consternation drip from your entity-ness.
Humanism:
The feeling of being a morally superior, detached observer is a practice for scientist and art appreciator alike. The major difference is the goal of the search. Scientists search for uniformity and rule based logic. Art appreciators search for beauty, irony or even iconoclasm. They both search as spectators. They both gravitate towards essentialism. They both are Playing God and getting very human endorphin/serotonin rewards for this radical detachment. Ours is a futile quest to commandeer universalism. Natural law mocks the reductionist. Artists mock our human ego to its foundation but only for the brain chemistry that comes with elitist satisfaction. Feigning anthropocentric distance, posthumans practice fluidity of self-definition. We are the studying machines made of meat, worms on two feet, bacterial bioreactors, and overgrown drosophila; there is no human. Certainly there is no superior spectacularity of essential humanity. We love dross and sculpt to refine our aesthetics. These days that includes sculpting our kindred. We are breeding for pleasure in a world of hurt. Our children will be posthuman but not superhuman. Bodily enhancement suffers the same pangs as other aesthetic qualms... passe-ism includes all versions of human being. And we are proud not to be proud.
Masturbation:
What excites you below the belt? What makes you wet and swollen with lust? These are the sites of erotic interchange. These are the acts that make you cum. That is life. That is pleasure, even diabolical pleasure. Study lust. Lust drives biotech: Fantastic gender trouble. Fantastic taboo. Fantastic victimization. Fantastic biomorphic somnambulism. Fantastic reproduction. Fantastic creations. These technologies are actual, eroticised and semi-accepted cultural practice. Our children are children of technolust. Jacking online into the spermbank of antiquated morphology, this is tomorrows breed.
Usenet Heredity:
Reason is equal to human sacrifice, a huge fad based on cliques of thin air. Every protocol creates taboo. Every culture is a cult becoming massified. What is screened out is an anarchic void created specifically to stabilize what is screened for. Why sidewalks? Why toenail clippers? How do these architectures ensure the homeless? Are you off the locus? We build our foundations on normalized psychosis which doubles as a cohesive monument to everyday stasis. Fetish monomania is a precursor to many of our most specific cultural norms. USENET (www.guba.com) is our best guide to daily fragmentation. The uncensored imagebank of 'what's worth scanning' is better than the Louvre. The varieties of monomania are our best next world recipes. Fragments of beauty are all in the eye of the polymaniac as beholder. This is culture, ranging from banality to beastiality and back. Usenet is the birthplace of our future bio-cultural norms.
Artificial Omnipotence:
The exploration of life is not predicated on moral grounds. Morality, or the artifice of benevolence, emanates from a lack of life experiences. On the same note, objectivist investigation is the money side of prostitution. We artists and scientists should play god. We invented the concept of a holy spectator and then succumbed to denial of our invention. If no one is watching, let us be the voyeurs and exhibitionists in the great show of revealing nature. But before we start again, let's throw away beauty and reason. Let's see if it's possible to explore without some kind of artifice, without the gods of logic or joy. Surely the combination of creative lust and technical prowess has led us only to the realization of autoerotic fantasies: Veil after veil lifts, in slippery sheens of translucent tissue. The human genome project, new reproductive technologies, trans-species chimeras, breast milk pharmacies; we are our own tormented mirrors. The hidden will be revealed, fact-by-fact, corpuscle-by-corpuscle. Eventually, it is hoped by all erect explorers, Nature will lay open, legs in the air. Or for the more brutally honest, legs bound open in universal stirrups, screaming and heaving under the heavy-handed methods of investigation. All these novel explorations are fantastically pornographic but who is watching. She is We, biting and bitten, laid bare and scoped thoroughly. The original fantasies are maligned by concepts of beauty and reason. The present fantasies are maligned by visions of purchase power (feigned utility.) Perhaps these concepts have run their course? Perhaps they are inhibitory? Is there an omnipotent atheism that dos not lay claim to beauty, use-value, reason or wealth? Ask a sexworker. Who plays?
Becoming Alive:
Sexwork may explain why so many of the biophilic arts are tornadoes of abstract undulation. The animal magnetic swarms in colorfields of breathing swimming anarchy. Self-organizing patterns mingle in every corpuscle, every barnacle, every wallet and every insignificant schmutz. There may be no reason, there may be no rhyme, but we, as organisms, are implicated. We are part of the macrocosm and the microcosm. No hornet's nest of taxonomy can stop our sprouting morass. And, there is nothing like the abstract time travel of magnification to prove how foreign and indescribable a universe we live in. Our universe which we try to buy and sell. Our universe that mocks control.
Dionysian Phlegma:
Let's celebrate our temporary passage through the vast unknown. Let's celebrate the insignificance of our petty reasoning. Let's celebrate the beauty of another world, one much like our own but without the impediment of faux recognition. The novelty of not knowing and the freedom of aesthetic-less bliss conjoin to make solid the unreal the lost concept of admitting inexperience. Concepts are like tethers, sloughed nerves, responsiveness derailed. Your brain is a sensual, wet organ not a bodiless judge. It is a giant clitoris not a super computer. Instead of imagining a YOU using your brain, surrender. Fail. Subcognition wins. Give up. Give up. Let it sweep you away in a spread eagle interface of ungrounded mortal nguhhh. Vital flow is transitory by its throbbing nature. Give up on poise. Give up. Fail. Unbottle your miasma. Seep...
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Adam Zaretsky, August 2002; A.Z. is an Artist and Biology Researcher centered in Woodstock, New York. This text was written on the occasion of exhibitions "DataBase" at Batagianni Gallery, Athens, 2002.
G l o s s a r y
Altered States, Modified Words
Mεταλλαγμένες καταστάσεις, τροποποιημένες λέξεις
A - Α
Apostrophes - Απόστροφοι
Architectural Ones (Units) and Zeros - Αρχιτεκτονικές Μονάδες και Μηδενικά
Abiochemistry memento mori - Ανόργανο νεκρικό ενθύμιο
B - B
Basoplasm Running Through - Bασεόφιλο ρέον πρωτόπλασμα
Βacchanalia in Body Setting - Βακχική γιορτή σε σωματικό σκηνικό
Bio-biscuits and Circuits - Bιο-μπισκότα και δίκτυα
C - K
Cellular architecture - Κυτταρική αρχιτεκτονική
Codes and Passwords - Κώδικες και Συνθήματα
Cyclotrons Whirling in Western Landscapes - Κυκλοτρόνια που στροβιλίζονται σε δυτικά τοπία
D - Δ
DNA Blending - DNA εν συνδέσει
Dorian Ageing - Ο Dorian Gray καθώς γερνάει
Dysfunctional Void - Δυσλειτουργικό κενό
Γ - G
Geolinks - Γαιοδεσμοί
Grounding Gravitation - Γειώνοντας τη βαρύτητα
Grammolecule: Υou Get Less and Less - Γραμμομόριo: πορεία προς το ελάχιστο
Ε - Ε
Eugenic Accidents - Eυγονικά ατυχήματα
Euphoric and Serene Synapses - Eυφορικές και γαλήνιες συνάψεις
Extracapsular Stroll - Εξωκαψική περιπλάνηση
G
Genome Forests, Genome Islands - Γονιδιακά δάση, γονιδιακά νησιά
Granular City - Σπυρωτή Πόλη
Gelatin Galaxy - Ζελατινώδης γαλαξίας
Φ - F
Fancy Interzone - Φανταστική ενδοζώνη
Faust Bargaining With Mephisto - Ο Φάουστ καθώς παζαρεύει με τον Μεφιστοφελή
Frenzy in a Hazy Bloodway - Φρενίτις σε ένα θαμπό αιμοφόρο αγωγό
Η - Θ
Heatwaves and Thermaesthesia - Θερμαισθησία και κύματα κάυσωνος
Hereditary Thrombocyte Torrent - Θρομβοκυτταρικός κληρονομικός χείμαρρος
Hydrogel Shattered Structure - Θριμματισμένη υδροδιαλυτή κατασκευή
Ι - Ι
Isocellular Islands - Iσοκυτταρικές νησίδες
In-vitro Scorpio Rising - In-vitro ανατολή του Σκορπιού
Ideomotion - Iδεοκίνηση
J
Jellyfish motion - Κίνηση Μέδουσας
Junk Blood Cells - Απόβλητα αιμοσφαίρια
Juicy junctions - Χυμώδεις κόμβοι
M - M
Marmelade of Genes and a few Other Ingredients - Mαρμελάδα από Γονίδια και μερικά άλλα συστατικά
Messages and Body Mailboxes - Μηνύματα και σωματικά ταχυδρομικά κουτιά
Monochrome Set - Μονοχρωματικό σύστημα
Λ-L
Libido is a Warm Gun - H Libido είναι ένα θερμό όπλο
Logic is Fuzzy, Brain is Oozy - Η λογική είναι ασαφής, ο εγκέφαλος στάζει
Lymph Mustard - Λυμφομουστάρδα
N - Ν
Night Journey on a Transmitter - Νυχτερινό ταξίδι με νευροδιαβιβαστή
Nexus and a Neural Ketchup - Ένα πλέγμα και μια κέτσαπ από νεύρα
O - Ο
Ontology of a Inner Journey - Oντολογία ενός εσωτερικού ταξιδιού
Op-Art Body Scene - Oπ-αρτ σκηνικό σώματος
Ozone Holes Gaping - Οπές χάσκοντος όζοντος
Q
Quake transmitter - Σεισμοδιαβιβαστής
Quartz Crystal Vibrations - Δονήσεις χαλαζιακού κρυστάλλου
Quanta Soup - Κβαντοσούπα
R - P
Radiogram: Shapes and Nightmares - Ραδιογράφημα: Σχήματα και εφιάλτες
Rhythmic Molecules, Split Seconds - Ρυθμικά μόρια, τετμημμένα δευτερόλεπτα
Rift in the Gene Valley - Ρήγμα στην κοιλάδα των γονιδίων
Σ - S
Shock protein - Συγκλονιστική πρωτεϊνη
Sirop, Blood and Other Splashes - Σιρόπι, αίμα κι άλλοι παφλασμοί
Synapses' Silent Quartet - Σιωπηλό κουαρτέτο συνάψεων
T - T
Timestorm - Χρονοτρικυμία
Techno-Chromosomes - Tεχνητά χρωμοσώματα
Tattoos on Cell Surfaces - Tατουάζ σε κυταρρικές επιφάνειες
Y - Y - U
Ulterior Body Secrets - Aνομολόγητα σωματικά μυστικά
Ultra-sonic mapping - Yπερηχητική χαρτογράφηση
Undertones - Υπο-χρώσεις
P - Π
Picaresque Journey into a Bodyscape - Περιπλάνηση σε σωματικό τοπίο
Permeable Vectors in Space - Περατά ανύσματα στο διάστημα
Parody of an Imperfect Nature - Παρωδία μιας ατελούς φύσης
Χ - Χ - Ξ
X-linked, Sex-linked - Χ-συσχετισμοί, φυλετικοί συσχετισμοί
Xenobiotic Substances, Xenophobe Creatures - Ξενοβιοτικές ουσίες, ξενόφοβα πλάσματα
V
Venograms in Yellow Background - Φλεβοδιαγράμματα σε κίτρινο φόντο
Vertigo in a Vortex - Ίλιγγος σε δίνη
Viewpoint of Innerspace - Άποψη ενδοδιαστήματος
Z - Ζ
Zee and Two Zeros - Ζήτα και δύο μηδενικά
Zig-Zag Cyto-diagram - Ζιγκ-ζαγκ κυτταρικό διάγραμμα
Zoomythology - Zωομυθολογία
____________________________________
Σώτη Τριανταφύλλου - Ιούνιος 2002
Soti Triantaphyllou - June 2002
Η Σ.Τ. είναι συγγραφέας και θεωρητικός της Αμερικάνικης Ιστορίας. Ζεί στην Αθήνα και στο Παρίσι. | S.T. is a writer and an American History scholar based in Athens and Paris.
This text was written on the occasion of 2002 solo exhibitions: "DataBase", Batagianni Gallery, Athens, and "Geolinks", Zina Athanassiadou Gallery, Thessaloniki
