Are artists and engineers inventing the culture of tomorrow?

Abstract

The human body represents the ultimate entity through which the world is shaped and interpreted. These days, advances in the field of biotechnology redefine the borders between human beings and their environment; contemporary evolutionary patterns coincide with a technology that have developed detached from any cultural discourse. From an artistic point of view, it is unfortunate that there is little possibility to be responsibly involved in the discourse concerning biotechnology and culture. In fact, this matter concerns our society and its various agents. No longer can it remain solely the realm of engineers whose research, while largely ignoring the broader social ramifications of biotechnology, exerts increasing influence on our daily lives.Given this cultural backdrop, it is not surprising that several artists and designers have critically positioned themselves within the fields of biotechnology and genetic engineering; thus in the late 1980s, a new term, Bioart, evolved: shaped by a complex technology and its appropriation by artists, Bioart engages and examines genetic engineering and its impact on the contemporary cultural environment.This article reflects on these developments and questions the possibility of an artistic practice related to synthetic biology. It bases itself on a project realized by a group of students in the fields of media art and genetic engineering from the Bauhaus University Weimar and the University of Heidelberg called Super Cell, presented at the iGEM competition 2010 at MIT. Furthermore, it draws upon and investigates potentialities for a social and cultural involvement of practitioners on an interdisciplinary level.