Biotechnology:
Roboter / Sensoren und Pflanzen / Tiere:
Kunst:
Yucca Invest Trading Plant (pdf) (pic)
Ola Pehrson’s latest works: the Market. We are fed daily with reports about the state of the financial markets: The market reacted thus and thus to the statement of the Prime Minister; The market reacted negatively to a forecasted reduction in unemployment, etc. If it has long been claimed that political decisions are increasingly being made on the terms of capital rather than on ideological grounds this is at least evident today. Ola Pehrson’s Yucca Invest Trading Plant can be seen as a picture of the market’s logic, or lack of logic. A Yucca palm has been coupled to a computer using electrodes, and the electrical currents that are registered govern purchasing or selling indications for a number of shares. If the Yucca palm does not give a positive result it gets no water, whereas if it succeeds it is given water and can grow more. Here the market undeniably appears as the nervous and irrational system that it is, in which every decision is as dependent on gut feeling as on intellectual and technical calculations. The work also links to the terminology that pervades economic language — growth, offshoots — words that seem to indicate a natural law. The ‘market’ is increasingly depicted in this fashion by the frequently paradoxically servile media. Was it not Fredric Jameson who said: We are living in a time when it is easier to imagine the end of the world than to conceive of a non-capitalist economy. slashdot.org
Small creatures
surround us in our everyday life. In our large-scale world, we sometimes are
not aware of their existence. Sometimes, these small creatures even anger or
annoy us by their presence. Isn't it a pity that we have either no relationships
with them or if any tent to have rather negative relationships with these small
creatures? Couldn't we somehow have better, more intimate relationships with
them?
With this instillation, we can understand and communicate with these creatures.
Its mechanism enables us to interact and create friendships with animals whom
we might otherwise never notice.
Bio- und Human-Tracking-Systeme:
Breath II: Growing Pleasure (siehe auch Breath I-IV und Biotechnology: REM)
Growing Pleasure (1998) is a microbiological and installation project. The sculptural elements of the piece include 'organelles' or hollow body forms connected with a network of latex tubing. The organelles were sculpted in ground beef and then cast into clear rubber for the piece. Upon exhibition, the insides of the organelles and connecting tubes will be coated with agar (a nutrient substance which is used to grow bacterial and fungal cultures). The organs at the base of the piece will be inoculated with Serratia marcescens. This is a harmless bacteria that is pigmented bright red in color. As the red bacteria grows, it will push upwards through the network of tubes, slowly (re)fill all the organs with life. Conceptually, the lifeless meat (ground beef) that was used to create the organelles will be revived into a new self-sustaining, wall-mounted, organismal network.