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Thesis Info
- LABS ID
- 00377
- Thesis Title
- Crafting Synthetics: Interdisciplinary Art and Life's New Design
- Author
- Britt Wray
- E-mail
- hello AT brittwray.com
- 2nd Author
- 3rd Author
- Degree
- MA
- Year
- 2012
- Number of Pages
- 102
- University
- Ontario College of Art and Design University
- Thesis Supervisor
- Dr. David Cecchetto
- Supervisor e-mail
- Other Supervisor(s)
- Language(s) of Thesis
- English
- Department / Discipline
- Interdisciplinary Master's in Art, Media and Design
- Copyright Ownership
- CC
- Languages Familiar to Author
- English, French
- URL where full thesis can be found
- Keywords
- synthetic biology, DIY biology, citizen science, art, design, craft, critical theory, cultural studies
- Abstract: 200-500 words
- In this thesis I examine and assess contemporary interdisciplinary theory and practice in art, design, citizen science and synthetic biology. I explain the differences between the three main knowledge distinctions of synthetic biology today (DNA based device construction, genome driven cell engineering and protocell creation), and identify prominent artists, designers, and citizen scientists who are creating new modes of interdisciplinary labour therein. My survey of these individuals and organizations locates them in Isabelle Stengers’ notion of the Ecology of Practices, which I also connect to my own writing and art practice as a DIY textile crafter. In the DIY Body Project, I have made a space for the public to generate its own evolving narrative of what a synthetic body can mean, look like and function as through collaborative methods of open-source resource sharing and playful making. Without promoting a specific rhetoric of the body as human, the synthetic as machine, or the biological as computable as is often seen in biotechnology, I take an openended approach to what it might mean to make formal decisions about constructing bodies through the arrangement of crafted corporeal components, as is literally done in lab of the synthetic era. The installation, which takes place in the Ontario Science Centre as well as online at wwww.diybody.org explores how knowledge is shaped through participatory methods both in the gallery setting, and in the home.