Michael Burton
http://www.michael-burton.co.uk/

“Future Farm” and “Nanotopia” present scenarios drawn from the current desperate reality of severely deprived people who reconsider their body as a site of financial income. The works predict a future scenario where people grow and produce new clinical and pharmaceutical products as well as adipose stem cell on and in the body.

Marieke Staps

http://www.mariekestaps.nl

This clock runs on mud and is called an earth battery. An earth battery is a pair of electrodes made of two dissimilar metals, such as zinc and copper, and these metals are buried in the soil. The bacteria in the soil can create webs of electrical wiring that transform the soil into an environmentally friendly source of energy. The copper and zinc transport the energy to the clock. The pair of plants can deliver 1.5 v, and the more cells you have, the more electricity you can create. The soil needs to be moist so that the metal has enough friction. So make sure that you water the plants!

Free and environmentally friendly energy forever and ever.

Britta Riley, Rebecca Bray
http://www.submersibledesign.com/drinkpee/

The project “Drink.Pee.Drink.Pee.Drink.Pee” reconsiders urine as a rich source of nutrients instead of a waste product. The Urine Fertilizer Lab transforms your urine into fertilizer for your houseplants, removing elements that are toxic to the waterways where your urine ends up. Participants pee in a jar, learn about urine and its role in the water cycle, perform a multi-stage reaction, and walk away with a dry fertilizer derived from their own bodies.

The project was born of the question: how might we thoughtfully and actively participate in our ecosystems and better manage the impact of human presence on the planet?

Human urine traverses ecosystems. When we flush our pee down the toilet, its powerfully concentrated nutrients pollute aquatic ecosystems. Because urine is not fully treated by current sewage treatment plants, excess nitrogen and phosphorus in human urine cause suffocating algae overgrowth in waterways. Our medications can cause sterility or mutation in other life forms. Traces of human medicines remain in the bodies of water from which we all eventually drink.

However, this liquid by-product of our daily lives need not be a pollutant. Urine can be a rich food source if it gets into the RIGHT part of the right ecosystem.

The way we deal with our urine across the globe exemplifies unnatural management. The latest innovations in environmentally responsible sewage treatment attempt to recycle nutrients back to fertilizer. However, like most attempts to mass-manage the ecosystem, the sheer size of the project creates its own problems. Mass solutions involve long-distance pathways, huge volumes of man-made material infrastructure, and vast amounts of energy.

Potentially what lies ahead is a softening and dispersal, a naturalization of agency in which we evolve away from centralized mass-management of ecosystems. Instead of sending our pee through miles of new pipes and then buying fertilized food grown from pee-derived fertilizer, we might recycle our urine for our own houseplants, shrinking the sprawl of the nutrient exchange to a size appropriate for our own sphere of responsibility. The “Drink.Pee.Drink.Pee.Drink.Pee” project asks participants to look at their own urine as something beyond waste, and instead as a potentially rich nutrient that can be thoughtfully managed in their own ecosystems.

Perhaps we can evolve from passive supporters of centralized mass-management into a network of sentient ecosystems. If put into the hands of the masses, future innovations in technologies such as nanotechnology, biochemistry and sensing might allow us all to better convert materials within our immediate surroundings, rather than simply consuming and then disposing of them. We can be more active humans at the center of our own microenvironments, enthusiastically brokering ever-new opportunities for exchanges of hyper-local organic materials and intelligently managing our own role in continuous natural cycles.

Workshops (limited for twelve participants):
Thu 3.9. 13:00 – 14:30 and 15:00 – 16:30
Fri 4.9. 13:00 – 14:30 and 15:00 – 16:30
Sat 5.9. 13:00 – 14:30 and 15:00 – 16:30
Sun 6.9. 13:00 – 14:30 and 15:00 – 16:30
Mon 7.9. 13:00 – 14:30

Bibi Nelson, Isabel Lizardi, Matt Johnson, Becky Pilditch
http://www.bareconductive.com

“Bare” is the result of a graduate project at the Royal College of Art, created by Bibi Nelson, Matt Johnson, Isabel Lizardi and Becky Pilditch. This project began as an experimental investigation of parasitic technology, and developed into an exploration of the possibilities for bridging the gap between electronics and the body. “Bare” is an innovative and unique material that allows users to interface with electronic devices directly through gesture, movement and touch. The final formula was developed through a design-led material exploration. A thorough study of the history of body art and ornamentation led to the creation of an ink that humanizes wearable technologies and provides a sensuous method of applying electronics to the body through customized circuitry.

In its current form, “Bare” can be applied with a brush, stamp, or spray, and has been used to send information between people, people and computers, and to power small devices such as LEDs. The ink is currently best suited to low power, information-lean applications such as switching and simple data transfer. However, other potential application areas include dance, music, computer interfaces, communication and medical devices. The ink has the potential to sensually replace and augment existing technologies where wires are cumbersome or undesirable.

Temporary, non-toxic and water-soluble, this material is composed of non-metallic conductive particles suspended in food and cosmetic additives. This combination is the result of extensive research into a wide array of inert and non-toxic ingredients allowing for the safe application directly on the skin. The development process behind “Bare” generated over 120 different material samples before reaching the final formula. Connections between the ink and electronic devices are made through small electrodes placed directly on the skin that can transmit data either wirelessly or via cables.

“Bare” has been used to either power small devices directly, such as LEDs or to interface with the computer. The most poignant interface demonstration allows a dancer to use the surface of their skin as a musical instrument, simultaneously choreographing dance and composing music. In this performance, “Bare” is used as a conductive medium, bridging between electrodes placed on surfaces around a space (typically walls and floor). As different parts of the dancer’s body touch between these contacts, musical notes and patterns are created. The dynamic properties of the material allow for a wide variety of musical expression through manipulation of tone and rhythm. The result of this direct interaction between movement and sound is a unique and compelling performance.

Caden Enterprises
http://theearthangel.ie/index.html

“The Earth Angel” is a brand new, innovatively designed adult toy that was designed and developed in Ireland. It is the first ever adult toy to contain “green” technology. Over the last few years there have been attempts made to produce a 100% environmentally friendly sex toy but so far none have lived up to expectations. “Green” sex toy manufacturers are focusing more on the materials used in their toys than on the operation of the toys. There have been some offerings of solar powered and moon powered toys, but these are not without their disadvantages.

“The Earth Angel” has all the benefits and none of the disadvantages. Unlike traditional “green” toys it will never require replacement batteries as it houses its own patented power core. Intense vibrations from the word go. A specially adapted key is fitted within the base and is extracted and turned to initiate the power core. A few quick turns … and hey presto!! … you have a fully charged, incredibly intense vibrator. All elements of “The Earth Angel” have been used with the environment in mind—from the internal parts to the outer packaging. We have only produced our vibrator in one colour, white, in keeping with the concept behind the product. “The Earth Angel” is manufactured exclusively for Caden Enterprises to the highest quality control standards and has been given a medical certificate of quality. The designed packaging displays “The Earth Angel” to its best advantage.

Clear, clean and 100% recyclable …

When developing “The Earth Angel”, the task was to produce an environmentally friendly sex toy that appealed to all consumers regardless of gender, age or ethnicity. Using the patented technology more environmentally friendly sex toys will be produced. Every industry has an obligation to do as much as it can to reduce the effects of climate change.

Quelle: Maarten Willemstein

Daan van den Berg

“From an unknown location, I break into IKEA’s computer server. In this nerve centre, the CAD files for every IKEA product are stored and downloaded worldwide. By infecting the CAD files with the ‘Elephantiasis virus’ I have just designed, I can hack the entire range of products. The virus causes random deformities, like lumps, cracks and humps, which only show up when the customer prints his product at home with his 3D printer.”

The “MERRICK” originated during a fantasy about the development described above. The “MERRICK” is a digital file infected with the human Elephantiasis virus and then converted into a tangible product by using a 3D printer. Every lamp that is printed will therefore be different.

Three-dimensional printing at home might sound like science fiction. But it is far from unthinkable. Consumer 3D printing is still in its infancy, but is expected to touch off a new revolution.

Adam Brandejs
http://www.brandejs.ca

In our modern world of fast and easy consumption we rarely pay any thought to where products actually come from and how they were produced. Many times we assume mass produced items were simply built by a series of machines. Unfortunately the reality is that we usually exploit other humans to produce goods as cheaply as possible. We place our well being over that of others, and usually for trivial objects.

As this piece deals with issues of sweatshop labor and content ownership, each piece of skin is different in color, size, and texture and the Nike Logo is done in white and placed prominently overtop.

This moving and twitching shoe is stitched together with multiple pieces of latex rubber, cast out of molds made from my own skin. The shoe’s toe and heel raise and lower as it occasionally vibrates/pulsates, and twitches on the floor as if it were still alive.

While the flesh is disturbing the reality behind the issue is far more disturbing. We live in a culture that is disconnected from what it is doing to itself and others and we choose to ignore rather than deal with the reality we have created for ourselves.

Adam Brandejs
Rob Sherwin: Rob was an immense help throughout this piece and he was my third and fourth hands near the end when I needed it. (Thanks Buddy).
Crystal Pallister: Handled the makeup on “Genpets” that added a true level of realism to the creatures.
http://www.brandejs.ca

In 1985, the US Patents and Trademarks Office (PTO) affirmed the legal precedent, ruling that genetically engineered plants, seeds and plant tissue could all be patented. Today, agricultural crops are being modified and organisms with built-in obsolescence are being sold as commodities. Life itself is quickly becoming a processed commodity in the privatization of nature. Biological engineering by large companies, outside of nature, has become a terrifying reality for my generation to contend with.

Today, we are well within the process of desensitizing an upcoming generation towards accepting bioengineering as “natural”. I see this generation slowly and systematically being desensitized towards owning and manipulating life through toys that mimic living creatures but carry no weight of responsibility with them. Individually these objects are harmless, however when analyzing the trends in consumption on a larger scale, we can see that with every new toy the envelope is pushed a little further. Bioengineered pets would not have been acceptable yesterday, but they could be today. Boundaries have been eroded.

My belief is that this is leading us even further down the path of objectifying living matter and “Genpets” is my interpretation of how such a relationship would take form as we continue to artificially separated ourselves from nature and treat it more as a ‘product’.

Any new technology can bring with it both positive and negative ramifications. Thus it is important that we be critical of both sides and ask questions every step of the way. I see how we treat the life already surrounding us, which we have no moral claim over, and I fear for any life brought into the world through the act of genetic manipulation—life that would inherently have patented DNA. It would not be far fetched to assume that any such creation would have no rights of its own and be subject to whatever treatment deemed necessary upon it. Whether by testing, or packaging, this life would be a commodity of less value than any we have today. “Genpets” is meant to ask questions about a great deal of issues by providing a tangible example of a possible future.

Shen Shaomin

Shen Shaomin
http://www.shenshaomin.com

SHEN SHAOMIN, “BONES OF CONTENTION”

John McDonald

Shen Shaomins skeletons of imaginary creatures send one’s thoughts back to the debates generated by Charles Darwin’s ‘dangerous idea’, and forward to the Faustian ambitions of contemporary science. The bones of humans and animals we dig from the earth are the most basic and poignant proofs of existence. They testify to the act of being, and -in the hands of forensic scientists-provide clues as to the physical appearance and properties of the living creature. They do not, however, tell us anything about the mind or the personality that was once contained by that carriage of bones. Science deals in facts and leaves art to provide the imaginative and sentimental elements. It is one of the abiding conceits of Shaomin’s work that the artist mimics the role of the natural scientists. He presents us with a museum of relics that seem, at first glance, to have been excavated by archaeologists. We look upon a skeletal menagerie that has never truly existed, although the bones and bone meal he uses have been drawn from real animals. This gives his creations an uncanny verisimilitude ?they are eerily reminiscent of Dr. Frankenstein’s experiments in stitching together a new life from remnants of the dead.

[…]

Part of the impact of Shaomin’s work comes from his willingness to create strange hybrids between species and to upset conventional expectations about scale. Some of his creatures resemble gigantic insects, in the manner of the bug-eyed monsters of the B-movies, yet they may have elements suggestive of fish or animal forms. The many small pieces in installations such as Experimental Field No.2, are combinations of animal and vegetable, as though small, sharp-clawed creatures were growing from between the leaves of a Chinese cabbage. In another work, the skeletal infants have been nurtured inside cocoons that look like huge pea pods. These clustered sculptures are even more disturbing than the large individual pieces, insofar as they portray a deliberate breeding program, with some anonymous intelligence at work behind the scenes.

There is a warning here about science running out of control, but also a delight in theatrical detail ?in the sense that each piece acts as a prop in some unknown narrative. Shaomin never aims to capture a completely lifelike illusion, in the manner of a sculptor such as Ron Mueck, he shows us only the relics of life. His creatures are not only dead, they have been frozen stiff by some sudden disaster, as bodies were embalmed by volcanic ash during the destruction of Pompeii. He apparently suggests that there are deathly consequences when scientists go wading boldly into the gene pool.

There is a double irony in these works being made by a Chinese artist, because China, of all nations, has had one of the most ruthless attitudes towards the exploitation of the natural world. Mao’s promethean?vision saw Nature as an unruly resource that had to be subdued at all costs, and parts of the country will long suffer the effects of pollution. With the introduction of a market economy, and China’s rapid ascension to the point where it is now the world’s largest industrial consumer of raw materials, there may be much worse to come. It is, perhaps, a further irony that Shaomin makes these works in an old factory in a northern industrial city, playing foreman to a team of assistants.

As China’s industrial and trading might continues to grow, it also continues to send exhibitions of archaeological finds to international museums. Even during the worst days of the Cultural Revolution, Chinese authorities were always ready to conjure up a show of recently-discovered relics, to suggest an ongoing concern with national heritage. In more open and friendly times, these shows have flourished. Many who viewed

Shaomin’s sculptures when shown at Gallery 4a in Sydney, in June 2004, may have seen an exhibition of Chinese dinosaur bones last year at the Australian Museum. It is difficult to know whether one should emphasise the differences between the two shows or the similarities. In one sweeping gesture, Shaomin satirises the overwhelming hubris of science, and the timeless appeal of the touring dinosaur show. He points out where science and popular culture intersect – in our fascination with the skeletons of vanished behemoths and those small but sinister genetic experiments waiting to be born.

Lawrence Malstaf
http://www.fortlaan17.com

Chance = Change
On the work of Lawrence Malstaf
Luk Van den Dries

The first time I was confronted with the work of Lawrence Malstaf was at a theatre performance. “Sauna in exile” was a project he had done with Mette Edvardsen, Heine Avdal and Liv Hanne Haugen. It had a lasting impression on me. As is the case with all work from Lawrence Malstaf, the starting point is very clear and simple. In the middle of the room there was a sauna that was surrounded with all kinds of chill out zones where you could listen to music, see video performances or just have a drink. But the real heart of the performance is the sauna itself—the genuine article because the visitors have to get into his or her bathrobes to enter the installation. Once naked you surrender yourself to the hot air—and before you know it an equally naked actor introduces you to the use of vihta, tree branches that stimulate your blood flow. A few people even evaporate on the scene and minutes later you witness the start of a choreography.

That choreography also evaporates into the heat and sweat. And right here is the essence of the work: evaporation. Being naked and in bathrobes all difference between ‘visitor’ and ‘actor’ disappears. I am in the sauna, naked and I am on the scene, evaporating. Maybe I even look like an actor if seen from the bar on a higher floor? But is this even important? Isn’t this work just all about your own experience? Nothing in this theatre needs to be told, shown or imagined. It is about different things. The observation of the body by the body and by the people surrounding you. It is the intensity of the senses. How heat and cold change your body and your reactions. This is experience theatre in which you as audience create your own theatre space, in which you are free to do as you please. Theatre on your naked skin.

Central to this experience is the visitor surrendering to the successive heat and cold waves, just like in any real sauna. But this is a sauna squared, a sauna in the fictional theatre space. It is in fact just a representation of a sauna, but this is precisely the deciding factor that provides the extra experience. Being exposed (in different ways) creates different side effects. The visitor enters a liminal zone of seeing and being seen that influences perception and action. It has a delicate and widespread effect on your body that is felt in your smallest veins. It is corporeal because of its sensory perception, but it also influences your self-image and projection. It is a kind of melting consciousness of the self within the context of an interactive installation in which everybody is equal.

This hyper-activation of all your receptors touches the heart of the alchemy of the theatrical representation. The experience is as real and as false as any other theatre night, but it is more violent because of the melting processes that occur and the evaporation of the difference between observation and participation. The fear of being exposed, the consciousness of observing, but especially the observation of the body lead to more inner reflection. It is a kind of corporeal seeing in which every stimulation is experienced by the theatrical display you are a part of. It can be compared to meditating in the rush hour. Trying to reach your inner self in the middle of chaos. It is not just the sauna that is in exile—it is also the visitor that is in and out of his or her body at the same time.

Malstaf did not only design the sauna but also some of the surrounding installations. “Shaft” is one of them: a plastic tube that works like a vacuum cleaner and sucks up different objects. The visitor lies on the sofa underneath the tube and watches as plates float on air until they hit each other and break into pieces. The tension in this installation is created by the contrast between your relaxed body and the floating and breaking plates above your head. Calm and danger delicately balanced. One can see the installation as a metaphor for a comparable situation during a psychiatric session, but the raw effect on the body seems more important here. Relaxation and stress combined. What happens in your perception? Which muscles are tense and which ones are not? How do you channel your fear? These changes in perception are always at the heart of the works of Lawrence Malstaf. He smoothly attacks your skin, ears, balance and vision. He makes you lose your balance and control and gets you breathing differently. In the very moment that your heart skips a beat, Malstaf strikes.

“Shaft” is exemplary for most of the works of Lawrence Malstaf. They are all aimed at sensory deception. Not like Escher with his visual rebus work, but by immersing and exposing the visitor to contrasting impulses. Malstaf invites you to his twilight zone where your pre-programmed perception is challenged. In anthropology this is known as limen (Victor Turner): a transitional stage with its very own rules in which new situations are prepared and tested. These moments are stuck between reality and fiction and are used by Turner to describe the particularity of rituals. Richard Schechner applies liminality to the theatre in which transitional stages are used to see how we can look at man and world. Malstaf approaches liminality in the same way as these great thinkers, he also saves a stage that is different but not detached from reality. He erects glass walls through which you can still vaguely see that reality. In this free stage he invites you to be vulnerable. His installations require submission and sensitivity. Leave your clothes in the dressing room and enter into a world of possibilities.

Dramaturgy of the machine

Malstaf’s interactive installations have their own dramaturgy. They look friendly and comfortable. They look inviting and contemporary. Neatly designed, light and transparent. And then suddenly something inside starts to growl and the friendly installation becomes a mean machine and starts to hiss, suck and turn. The air pressure changes. Invisible valves and pumps start to work. The calm that was is sucked into a turbine, reduced to atoms and spat out. And then suddenly the machine becomes silent yet again, too silent. And you are back in the calm and comfortable surroundings you were in before. Was that just the wind? Or was it someone else who caused my inner storm?

Malstaf’s installations are notably theatrical. Just like Greek drama. Life becomes a mess in just a few minutes. All it takes is a little passion and the whole thing starts to shake. It becomes uncontrollable and everything falls apart. One minute it is caressing you and the next it wants to destroy you. A gentle breeze turns into a hurricane. What looked like a mirror now explodes like a tsunami. The momentum is of the essence, the exact point in time when everything changes. Malstaf stages time like a rotation mechanism. Something starts to shake and sets a whirlpool in motion. It comes to life and starts breathing. The rest is all tragedy.

Malstaf installations deceive the eye. The visitor is always part of the picture. The machine requires a direction of view. In front, underneath or right in the middle. Very rarely above. Malstaf turns the visitor into the object, the submissive part. The machine forces you to take position and then undermines your contemplation. Your mirror image is shattered into a thousand pieces, like in “Mirror” (2002). A renaissance portrait of a woman is sucked away by a vacuum pump, turning the mouth into an outlet pipe of a bath (“Whirlpool”, 1999). Everything around you starts to twirl as if you are in the eye of the storm (“Nemo Observatorium”, 2000). Walls start to move and the room becomes a labyrinth (“Nevel”, 2003). All these tragic machines have their moment of rage, a kind of blindness that reflects the flaws in your own view. This is how they invite you to look inside. But once the rage is over they become vulnerable, drained, and powerless. And then you sit down with some form of shame, in front, inside or underneath. Waiting for that moment when everything changes again.

The Bible and the motor

“Sandbible” is the work that strikes me the most in the Malstaf exposition ‘Freestate’. It is an older work from 1999 that is not an interactive installation. Underneath a sheet of glass you see an open book with a rectangle cut out. In that rectangle there is some sand. Suddenly the machine starts and the sand starts to tremble, forming new figures over and over again. And then the machine stops and the sand finds its peace once again. This clash between that most holy of books and the machine that puts everything in motion is fascinating. The motor strikes at the heart of the Bible. The grains of sand follow their own path in the Bible, forming strange signs, hieroglyphics waiting for the creative reader. The work has several layers in several ways. Some will really feel the hole in the Bible; others will cherish the unlimited amount of signs in the sand.

This work defines Malstaf’s artistic creed because it displays the new technological condition: the motor controls the Bible. The core of Malstaf is the technology he uses. The image is changed by any number of technological applications; it is alienated from its static expression and constantly searches transformation. There is constant experimentation with new technology to show its effect on perception. From that angle the use of all these machines is much more than a gimmick. A work like “Sandbible” hints at a change of paradigm: the laws of physics substitute the law of God. But Malstaf’s metaphysics are exciting and interesting because they are ruled by coincidence. The plates in “Shaft” follow their own path, the grains of sand in “Sandbible” write their own signs. And thus Malstaf’s artistic practice is closely related to the research of physicist Ilya Prygogine and his famous formula: chance = change.

Performances
Thu 3.9. 12:30 – 13:00 & 14:30 – 15:00
Fri 4.9. 12:30 – 13:00 & 14:30 – 15:00
Sat 5.9. 13:00 – 13:30, 14:30 – 15:00 & 16:30 – 17:00
Sun 6.9. 12:30 – 13:00, 14:30 – 15:00 & 16:30 – 17:00
Mon 7.9. 12:30 – 13:00, 14:30 – 15:00 & 16:30 – 17:00
Tue 8.9. 12:30 – 13:00

additional Performers:
Amel Andessner
Elisa Andessner
Nora Riedl
Wolfgang Tragseiler

Werner Jauk, Heimo Ranzenbacher

The installation “Moving Mountains” quotes a classical triptych in which the process of globalization of a piece of lawn is steered by the (hedonist) appraisal of the observers. Real estate value and estimated value, or appraisal, are the parameters guiding a search for correspondences in economically and socially relevant data; in this way the piece of lawn “stains” the world, transforming a piece of nature into culture.

Credits:
Software development: Michael Augustyn
Many thanks to Franz Brunner, Institute of Geography and Regional Science / KFUni-Graz
Walter Buzina, Institute of Hygiene, Microbiology and Environmental Medicine / Meduni-Graz
Doris Jauk-Hinz, grelle musik
Institute of Music Studies, KFUni-Graz
Sponsored by: The City of Graz – Culture + The State of Styria – Culture

Hida Beef Research Department

Prizewinning steer Yasufuku is regarded as the father of hida beef, a high-quality meat famous for its marbled texture and rich flavor. Now, 13 years after its death, Japanese scientists have succeeded in cloning the legendary animal. “Cloned Beef” is the latest successful cloning experiment; in 2008, a mouse that had spent 16 years in a deep-freeze was cloned. The “resurrection” of Yasufuku not only catapults a tradition into the 21^st century; it also makes it possible to use the clone as the subject of sustainable research on the genetic and environmental conditions that are necessary to preserve the quality of this traditional breed for the future.

Shoji Takeuchi

collabrators:
Yuya Morimoto, Yukiko Tsuda

affiliations:
BEANS Project, NEDO & Institute of Industrial Science, The University of Tokyo

We have demonstrated a 5-millimeter tall doll by stacking cellular beads in a three-dimensional(3D) mold. Since this method allows us to fabricate three-dimensional in vivo like tissue structures, it can be applicable in the fields of regenerative medicine and drug development.
To prepare the celluar bead that is a hydrogel beads coated with cells, we used an axisymmetric flow-focusing device (AFFD) for producing monodisperse micro collagen beads. We then seeded 3T3 cells on the surface of the collagen beads.
By putting these capsules in a 3D chamber and incubating them, we successfully established complicated and milli-sized 3D structures. For a duration of 24 hours, about 100,000 cell capsules of 3T3 cell coated 100-micrometer collagen beads were cultivated inside a human-like-shaped mold.
Once the cell capsules had coalesced to form the human-like-shaped mass of the cellular beads (5 mm tall), it was placed in a culture solution and can be handled by tweezers without breaking. We believe that various shapes can be possible by just changing the shape of the mold. This method is very useful for creating more complex system that functions as a living organism by combining multiple types of cells.

The “Cell Doll” is exhibited in the Ars Electronica Center Biolab.

Levi van Veluw
http://www.levivanveluw.com/

This 4-piece series reinterprets the traditional landscape painting, removing plots of grass, clusters of trees, babbling brooks from their intimate 2 dimensional formats and transposing them onto the 3 dimensional contours of his own face. Thus a fresh twist is given to the obsession inherent in the romantic landscape of recreating the world and simultaneously being part of it. The romantic landscape and self-portrait genres are combined as a means of re-examination.

The images that I make consist of often unlogical combinations of materials, patterns, colours, forms, with my head as the only constant factor. Each element is consciously chosen so as to affect a pre-determined transformation. By playing with the value of the each material and by using them for a purpose that was not originally intended for them, I construct within the image, in a very small way, a different perspective on the world.

In most cases it is my head that is the carrier of these transformations and combinations. The expressionless, and almost universal face, allows the viewer to project himself onto the work. Because the works have really existed and have not been digitally manipulated, each image contains a short history of a performance.

Repetition is a theme I find very interesting as you can use it for different ends. By for example using the same head and facial expression, the person slowly becomes of secondary importance to the form. The elements that remain constant lose their value and the elements that change, become the subject of the work. In this way I create a shift in the hierarchy of values.

The commonplace notion of the ‘aesthetic’ image is that which is free of unsatisfactory characteristics and general human imperfections. This in my opinion is the most superficial form of beauty. In my work I attempt to create a different form of aesthetic. The unusual and unimpressive materials, traces of glue and other imperfections that exist in the production of the work are what form the aesthetic value in my image. This revaluation of these normally insignificant elements only occurs because they now exist in a new context that distances them from their original circumstances and associations.

Courtesy Ronmandos Gallery