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In response to the accelerated pace of genetic research and the potential sociocultural impact of recent scientific developments on people's daily lives, the Weisman Art Museum is presenting a major exhibition that raises questions and provides commentary about the ethical and cultural possibilities of genomics, one of the most compelling issues of contemporary culture. Gene(sis): Contemporary Art Explores Human Genomics seeks to bridge art and science while showcasing powerful new artwork created in direct response to the Human Genome Project, to cultivate important public dialogue.
The University of Washington's Henry Art Gallery Curator, Robin Held, has developed this complex traveling exhibition over the course of three-and-a-half years, through on-going dialogue with artists, scientists (including senior scientists working on the Human Genome Project), educators, historians, and museum professionals. Interweaving humorous commentary, theatrical installations, documentary images and pseudo- (or actual) scientific laboratory situations, the artwork in the exhibition elucidates technical advances and probes ethical issues raised by genomic research. The exhibition aims to encourage public discourse and cultivate a deeper understanding of genomics and its relationship to contemporary culture and life.
From digitally altered photographs of "manimals" and artistic explorations of other transgenic beings, to DNA portraits and abstract "gene-mapping" paintings, Gene(sis) explores the potential social, emotional, and ethical implications of genomics. The exhibition features more than 50 works by renowned and emerging artists, including the midwest premiere of Eduardo Kac's important transgenic installation, Genesis (1999), and recent Macarthur Genius Grant recipient Ingio Manglano-Ovalles's photographic series, The Garden of Delights(1998).
Gene(sis) is organized into four sections representing the following themes:
Sequence
Work that interrogates both the language and structure of genomic and genetic research.
Specimen
Work that explores key issues of DNA ownership, personal privacy, and ethics. Some are drawing on the artists' personal encounters as medical consumers and employees. Others are looking to the history of these issues and their intersection with race and sexual difference.
Boundary
Work that showcases artists' investigations of the newly permeable boundaries between species and the ways in which transgenics has long haunted both Western and Eastern cultural imaginings, including Eduardo Kac's transgenic GFP Bunny aka "Alba," and large-scale, digitally altered photographs by Seattle artist Jaq Chartier.
Subject
Work that showcases re-imaginings of notions of individual subjectivity, family, and human "nature" in the wake of recent genomic developments. These include large-scale digital photographs exploring youth and aging by Margi Geerlinks, and Joan Fontcuberta’s Hemograms--enlarged photos of blood specimens.
The exhibition and related programs are made possible through the generosity of the Animating Democracy Initiative, a program of Americans for the Arts, funded by the Ford Foundation; the National Endowment for the Arts; The Rockefeller Foundation; the Allen Foundation for the Arts; PONCHO; the Walter Chapin Simpson Center for the Humanities; SAFECO; King County Arts Commission Special Projects Program; ZymoGenetics, Inc., and The University of Washington College of Arts and Sciences. Special thanks to Carl Zeiss, Inc.; The Elliott Grand Hyatt Seattle; Center for Digital Arts and Experimental Media; KUOW Public Radio, WRQ, Inc.; New Concepts Prototyping; Speakeasy Network; Northwest Mannequin; University of Washington Division of Genetic Pathology and University Bookstore Computer and Electronics Center.
Gene(sis) and related programs at the Weisman Art Museum are presented with the generous support of The Greenwall Foundation, New York; the Consortium to Address Social, Economic, and Ethical Aspects of Biotechnology, a USDA-IFAFS funded project; and at the University of Minnesota: the College of Biological Sciences; the Consortium on Law and Values in Health, Environment, and the Life Sciences; the Humanities Institute; the Medical School; and the Program in Agricultural, Food, and Environmental Ethics. In-kind support provided by the Design Institute at the University of Minnesota.
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