<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
<html>
<head>
<meta content="text/html;charset=ISO-8859-1" http-equiv="Content-Type">
<title></title>
</head>
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000">
<div align="left"><big><big><b>Radars & Fences II</b></big></big><small><br>
</small><big><big><b>Tactical Bioart in the Age of Biotechnology</b></big></big><br>
</div>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="http://blogs.nyu.edu/blogs/md1445/rf/">http://blogs.nyu.edu/blogs/md1445/rf/</a><br>
<br>
<br>
<b>Event Time<br>
</b><br>
Thursday, March 5, 2009<br>
4:30 PM - 8:30 PM<br>
<br>
<b>Location<br>
</b><br>
NYU School of Law<br>
Information Law Institute<br>
40, Washington Square South<br>
Room 218<br>
<br>
<br>
<b>Description<br>
</b><br>
Radars & Fences II features five researchers and artists who have
been at the forefront of the battle for the democratization of the life
sciences over the last decade: Beatriz da Costa, Natalie Jeremijenko,
Richard Pell, Claire Pentecost, and Paul Vanouse will present their own
work and discuss with the public models of interdisciplinary engagement
at the beginning of the "biological century."<br>
<br>
Please RSVP at
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="http://www.nyu.edu/media.culture/events/event.html?e_id=1336">http://www.nyu.edu/media.culture/events/event.html?e_id=1336</a><br>
<br>
<br>
<b>Schedule<br>
</b><br>
4:30 – 4:40 pm Welcome<br>
<br>
* Ted Magder, NYU Council for Media & Culture; Chair, Department of<br>
Media, Culture, and Communication, NYU<br>
<br>
4:40 – 4:50 pm Conference Overview<br>
<br>
* Marco Deseriis, Doctoral Candidate, Department of Media, Culture, and<br>
Communication, NYU<br>
<br>
<br>
<b>4:50 - 6:30 pm Panel: Tactical Bioart in the Age of
Biotechnology (Part I)<br>
</b><br>
* Beatriz da Costa, Associate Professor of Arts, Computation,
Engineering at the University of California, Irvine <br>
Of Pigeons, Microbes and Humans: earthly encounters in the 21st century<br>
<br>
* Richard Pell, Assistant Professor of Art, Carnagie Mellon University,
Pittsburgh Permitted Habitats and Endangered GMO's: An introduction to
the Center for PostNatural History.<br>
<br>
* Claire Pentecost, Associate Professor, School of Photography, Art
Institute of Chicago Fields of Zombies: Biotech Agriculture and the
Privatization of Knowledge<br>
<br>
<br>
6:30 - 7:00 pm Evening Break (Refreshments will be served)<br>
<br>
<b><br>
7:00 – 8:30 Panel: Tactical Bioart in the Age of Biotechnology
(Part II)</b><br>
<br>
* Paul Vanouse, Assistant Professor of Visual Studies, University at
Buffalo. <br>
Buffaloed and Bamboozled: DNA Hype in the Post-biological Era<br>
<br>
* Natalie Jeremijenko, Associate Professor of Visual Arts, Department
of Arts and Arts Professions, NYU <br>
Living together: on the shocking realities of cohabitation, the human
biome, the microbial imagination and wrestling the strongest animals in
the world.<br>
<br>
<br>
The panel is moderated by Alex Galloway, Associate Professor,
Department of Media, Culture and Communication, NYU<br>
<br>
<br>
***<br>
<b><br>
Rationale</b><br>
<br>
In the age of genetics, biotechnology, and bioinformatics, life is
increasingly<br>
fashioned and configured at the intersection of several discourses and
practices,<br>
such as population genetics, molecular and informatic sequences, human
enhancement technologies, and the therapeutic and agricultural
applications of genomics.<br>
<br>
Asides from raising crucial epistemological questions, these
technoscientific practices compete for attention, credibility, and
funding within the scientific community,<br>
the market place, and the public domain. But as the far-reaching
implications of biotech research unravel, the opacity and secrecy
surrounding the industry and the patenting of life become increasingly
problematic. This is partly due to the difficult ethical questions
raised by the life sciences, but also to the rapid extension of<br>
scientific knowledge production to a number of non-scientific
environments.<br>
<br>
As Bruno Latour (2001) has pointed out, the tendency of the
experimental method to transcend its modern boundaries is the result of
three distinct processes: 1) the end of the scientific laboratory as a
secluded space available only to specialists; 2) the increasing agency
of patients and ordinary citizens in formulating the scientific
questions to be solved; 3) and the extension of the scale of scientific
experiments to the whole planet, as in the case of global warming,
AIDS, and so on.<br>
<br>
Within this triple displacement, which turns the technoscientific
experiment into a more and more collective endeavor, a thriving
community of bioartists, researchers, and hobbyists have provided new
analytical and activist models by which to intervene and participate in
the life sciences. Through a broad set of hands-on interventions that
provide a critique-in-action of both the political economy and the
naturalization of the biotech industry, bioartists and researchers have
fostered interspecies contacts, engineered hybrid life forms, and set
up independent Biolabs. Together, they propose new scientific protocols
and call for a wider, and far more direct participation among lay,
artistic, activist, and academic publics.<br>
<br>
Radars & Fences II features five researchers and artists who have
been at the forefront of the battle for the democratization of the life
sciences over the last decade: Beatriz da Costa, Natalie Jeremijenko,
Richard Pell, Claire Pentecost, and Paul Vanouse will present their own
work and discuss with the public models of interdisciplinary engagement
at the beginning of the "biological century."<br>
<br>
<br>
*****<br>
<br>
This forum is being coordinated by doctoral candidate Marco Deseriis as
part of a grant awarded by the NYU Council for Media and Culture with
assistance provided by the Information Law Institute<br>
<br>
</body>
</html>