JENNIFER WILLET


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J.Willet
Why BioArt? Towards Redefining the Specialist 2007
DIAS DE BIOARTE07
CAPSULA, Barcelona, Spain.

Why BioArt?  Towards Redefining the Specialist
Jennifer Willet

This text serves as a brief introduction to an evolving series of texts under the title (RE)Embodying Biotechnology, that explores the public representations of biotechnology at the intersection of art, science, computation, and education with a social and political mandate towards the democratization of the biotech field.  Methodologically I am interested in proposing (and pursuing) artistic means for non-specialists to engage in biotechnology as an embodied practice.  Resulting in a complex text, that neither supports or denounces the advancement of biotechnology, (RE)Embodying Biotechnology – argues for a more holistic, certainly dialogical, understanding of evolving biotechnologies through practical means.

In general, the public holds very little currency in the decision-making processes that dictate research trajectories, evaluation criteria, and the direct application of advancements made in biotechnological sectors.  In general, I see the non-specialist public as having a receptive relationship to evolving biotechnologies.  In other words, individuals are on the receiving end of a long chain of events contributing to the proliferation of these knowledges and practices in the world – trusting the specialists to manage this aspect of technological proliferation on our behalf.  Generally, the public (as well as the specialist class) seems to be content with this arraignment.  However, I am interested in perusing models where the individual possesses a more empowered reciprocal relationship with biotechnology and other sciences.  A large part of the problematic, as I see it, is the over-specialization in the sciences tends to preclude any real invested participation on behalf of the individual non-specialist.  In other words, people don’t feel implicated in biotechnology - people don’t feel they have enough knowledge to assert their own opinions – we have conceded to the specialists make these complex and difficult decisions on our behalf.   I see this lack of implication and efficacy on behalf of the general public as the result of a deep seeded insecurity  - an established belief that science is intrinsically difficult and we, as lay folk (non-specialists), are incapable of understanding evolving biotechnologies, let alone participating in their development in any meaningful way.

One strategy for combating a programmed public malaise in the face of biotechnology is to effectively trump the authority of the specialist class with the insertion of non-authoritarian individuals into ‘specialist’ rolls in the public sphere.  The insertion of visible and intellectual difference into traditional roles of scientific authority can empower the general public to participate more fully in biotechnological debates.  I am interested in a participatory interdisciplinary incursion into the practice, and public representation, of biotechnology.  If artists, and accountants, and housewives are seen contributing to the production of biotechnology, the authority of the specialist – the doctor, lab technician, and scientist – will be reduced.  Alternative voices – subjectivities – and interpretations of biotechnology will be heard and perpetuated in public debate.  No longer will the white lab coat, and all that it signifies – the years of school, the complex language set, progressive rationality, and arguably access to natural truths – prevail as the only valid and authoritative voice in selectively determining biotechnological research trajectories and evaluation criteria.

I am particularly interested in mobilizing the transformative potential of the artist as a public figure for non-specialist participation in the sciences, and choose to focus in my writing (and my own practice) on the growing field of BioArt.  BioArt is many things, and its definition is debated avidly in art/science circles.  I see BioArt as the mobilization of biological systems in art practice.  This can include something as fundamental as the use of animals, plants, bacteria or the human body in the production of artwork – including live and deceased specimens.  BioArt can also include the biological sciences and biotechnologies in art production – including genetic engineering, tissue culture, and bioinformatics.  Often, BioArt involves the ‘live’ presentation of biological artworks in the public sphere – however, this is not always possible, and many practitioners present documentation, contextualizing their work as ongoing performances in the laboratory or other biological settings.

I think that BioArtists are particularly well equipped to participate in science in a fruitful manner for two reasons: (1) contemporary artistic research methodologies are inherently fluid and transdisciplinarity – able to adjust and re-adjust to the multiplicity of concerns, knowledges, and tendencies that is required to engage in an critical participatory relationship with scientists and scientific practices, and (2) in terms of opening up the public representation of non-specialists as participants in the hard sciences, artists serve as an ideal model for the democratization (and de-specialization) of biotechnological research.  If we see artists, on the television, in the newspaper, in the gallery, engaging actively with the tools of science and technology, it creates a precedence in the public conception of the sciences as a more open and fluid field where it is possible for all of us to participate in the production of knowledge.