Prior to this unit, I always associated experiments on living cells to be a strictly biological/scientific endeavor. However, I discovered several examples of artists using living matter as a medium for artwork.
One notable example is the Australian duo Oron Catts and Ionat Zurr, who go by the moniker Tissue Culture and Art Project, or TC&A for short. They've used animal cell cultures to make miniature wings, dolls, and lab-grown meat, to name a few (Miranda). Most notably, they cultured mice cells and integrated them with a biodegradable polymer matrix to create a tiny, leather-like coat.
Victimless Leather
In Australia, art and science lab SymbioticA created a "Semi Living Artist", consisting of a "brain", which consists of cultured fetal rat brain cells, and a "body", which is a robotic arm. Using an internet connection, the brain sends impulses to the body to create 2-D drawings in real time (Delgado).
Robotic arm of "Semi Living Artist"
These works of art force us to make the distinction between living matter and life, if there is one. While I am personally uncomfortable with using a living animal as a medium for art, I'm fine with using live cells as a medium. Many of the artists who do incorporate biotechnology actually have an ethical motivation for using living matter in their work, though. In making "Victimless Leather", TC&A intended to bring up the moral implications of manipulating and animals for producing leather and other aesthetic reasons, and to demonstrate a possibility of producing a similar result without actually killing animals (Victimless). By creating the "Semi Living Artist", SymbioticA aimed to explore what it means to be a thinking entity, and if the ability to think is equivalent to life itself (MEART).
These works of art certainly bring up compelling points, which naturally follow as artists push the boundaries of bio-art. Human creativity is limitless, and in some cases, should be kept in check for ethical reasons. In the lecture videos, Professor Vesna discussed how Alba, a transgenic rabbit, was made to glow when illuminated with a certain wavelength of light (5 Bioart Pt1).
Alba
This experiment was undertaken for scientific research. If it had been done for solely aesthetic reasons, though, I think that would have been unethical, because the only reasons behind it would be superficial, instead of helping us learn about the genome. Perhaps artists who have access to biotech should be subject to the same ethical review that scientists face when designing biotech experiments. In that case, we will have to decide if the permissions that research labs and artists receive should differ, and if so, by how much.
Works Cited
5 Bioart Pt1 1280x720. Victoria Vesna. YouTube. UCLA, 18 Sept. 2013. Web. 09 May 2015.
Alba. Digital image. GFP - Green Fluorescent Protein. Connecticut College, n.d. Web. 9 May 2015.
Delgado, Rick. "How Artists Are Blending Biotechnology And Art."MakeUseOf. N.p., 08 May 2015. Web. 09 May 2015.
MEART—The Semi Living Artist, SymbioticA, The Art & Science
Collaborative Research Lab, The Bakery, ARTRAGE Complex,
Northbridge, Dec 20, 2005
Miranda, Carolina A. "Weird Science: Biotechnology as Art Form." ARTnews. ARTnews Ltd., 18 Mar. 2013. Web. 09 May 2015.
Robotic arm of "Semi Living Artist". Digital image. MakeUseOf. N.p., 8 May 2015. Web. 9 May 2015.
"Victimless Leather." Victimless Leather. The Tissue Culture and Art Project, n.d. Web. 09 May 2015.
Victimless Leather. Digital image. MakeUseOf. N.p., 8 May 2015. Web. 9 May 2015.
Hello Abby,
ReplyDeleteI fully agree with your assertion that ethics need to be discussed in BioTech art. You mention how Alba was created for research purposes, much like other glowing animals are made (including puppies). If this were done for aesthetic purposes only, though, I agree that it would feel unethical. I think the real issue is, as you say, determining the line between living and alive. Cells grown in a dish are living, but they do not necessarily represent a creature that is alive. They cannot think or feel pain, so we generally do not subjugate them to the same ethical standards of test animals. I wonder if there will ever be any sort of regulation on these experiments, though, especially those that are not research-oriented. For example, if I engineered a rat brain that could receive pain signals and constantly stimulated it, essentially mimicking painful torture, would that be unethical? Even though the entire organism is not involved and we have no way of knowing what the tissue actually "feels," I would think that is wrong. I think that is a great area of discussion and one that will definitely be brought into the spotlight more and more as our scientific ability progresses.
Gabriel Monti
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