ART IMITATES LIFE-SCIENCE (page 4)
Other participants in the show appear to closely follow Davis', "rolled up sleeves" credo. George Gessert, based in Eugene, Oregon, breeds his own hybridized Irises that put into question issues surrounding aesthetics and beauty, as well as eugenics. The flowers are so surreal, they almost look as if they've been painstakingly hand-painted one by one. Gessert derives inspiration from the pioneering 1936 bio-art piece by Edward Steichen (believed to be the first ever bio-art piece) in which the artist altered delphiniums with a mutagen.
Perth, Australia based bio-artists Oron Catts, Ionat Zurr and Guy Ben-Ary of the Symbiotica studio have essentially brought their lab/care unit into LU. This is not just a symbolic gesture. The trio will stay in Nantes for weeks after this opening, to care for the up-keep of their pieces. Zurr explains the distinction between different types of artists working with biological themes, dividing them into three categories: 1/ A more conceptual model where artists use biological themes in their fantasy-based work, 2/ A hands-on approach using biological tools (like the artists featured in "L'Art Biotech" and 3/ Artists using illustrative imagery from science (cat scans, brainwaves, etc.).
One of Symbiotica's pieces for the show, entitled, "Worry Dolls," consists of vials of tissue creatively fashioned into tiny dolls whose style is something akin to Madonna in the "Human Nature" video meets Prince's Apollonia Six or Vanity. Guatemalans give their kids "Worry Dolls," and explain that they must tell them their worries so that the dolls can absorb the concerns and enable their dissipation. Catts wondered what it might be like if the "Worry Dolls" were made of cells and thus 'semi-living.' The dolls don't have immune systems so they would essentially 'die' if removed from their safe fluid-filled glass enclosures. Catts, Zurr and Ben-Ary 'feed' the dolls every day to ensure their survival (at least through the end of the exhibit, upon which they must let the dolls 'die').
About ten feet away from the 'dolls,' behind a clear plastic tarp, a dining room table is set in preparation for a meal that will not take place for another month and a half. Catts, Zurr and Ben-Ary have taken tissue samples of frogs, and 'grown' them on polymer scaffolding to create 'cruelty-free' frog steaks or (as the piece is entitled) "Disembodied Cuisine." At the culmination of this show, the three will sit down at the table and consume their creations. "We imagine that [eating the frog steaks] will be more like eating vegetables that we have grown in our garden than eating the chickens that were wandering in our back yard," says the Finnish-born Catts.
That many bio-artists seem somehow inextricably linked to their projects is obvious. Catts, Zurr and Ben-Ary create, care for, consume or ultimately allow their semi-living organisms to 'die.' New York artist, Chrissy Conant whose image adorns a drawing of a caviar tin, hung in the back gallery, used her own body (her eggs to be exact) in a piece entitled, "Making Chrissy Caviar." It is not surprising to hear that she cannot identify the U.S. reproductive practitioner who administered an unusual 'therapy' that allowed her to produce 12 eggs in one menstrual cycle instead of one. Paris based artists Marion Laval-Jeantet and Benoît Mangin of the collective Art Oriente Objet combined samples of their own dermal tissue with that of a pig and adorned the 'skin swatch' with graphics of various animals. And of course, any artist working with DNA is tapping into something that is part of us all.
"At the culmination of this show, the three will sit down at the table and consume their creations."
Hello Dolly: Oron Catts, Ionat Zurr and Guy Ben-Ary have created Guatemalan 'Worry Dolls' out of living tissue
Continue to Page 5: My Dinner with Orlan