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Joanna at 17:58, 21 September 2011

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	<blockquote>There is a tendency for living things to join up, establish linkages, live inside each other, return to earlier arrangements, get along, whenever possible. This is the way of the world. The new phenomenon of cell fusion, a laboratory trick on which much of today’s science of molecular genetics relies for its data, is the simplest and most spectacular symbol of the tendency. In a way, it is the most unbiologic of all phenomena, violating the most fundamental myths of the last century, for it denies the importance of specificity, integrity, and separateness in living things. Any cell – man, animal, fish, fowl, or insect – given the chance and under the right conditions, brought into contact with any other cell, however foreign, will fuse with it. Cytoplasm will flow easily from one to the other, the nuclei will combine, and it will become, for a time anyway, a single cell with two complete, alien genomes, ready to dance, ready to multiply. It is a Chimera, a Griffon, a Sphinx, a Ganesha, a Peruvian God, a Ch'i-lin, an omen of good fortune, a wish for the world.[v]</blockquote>		<blockquote>There is a tendency for living things to join up, establish linkages, live inside each other, return to earlier arrangements, get along, whenever possible. This is the way of the world. The new phenomenon of cell fusion, a laboratory trick on which much of today’s science of molecular genetics relies for its data, is the simplest and most spectacular symbol of the tendency. In a way, it is the most unbiologic of all phenomena, violating the most fundamental myths of the last century, for it denies the importance of specificity, integrity, and separateness in living things. Any cell – man, animal, fish, fowl, or insect – given the chance and under the right conditions, brought into contact with any other cell, however foreign, will fuse with it. Cytoplasm will flow easily from one to the other, the nuclei will combine, and it will become, for a time anyway, a single cell with two complete, alien genomes, ready to dance, ready to multiply. It is a Chimera, a Griffon, a Sphinx, a Ganesha, a Peruvian God, a Ch'i-lin, an omen of good fortune, a wish for the world.[v]</blockquote>
	<br> '''Semi-Living Art and Neolife''' <br><br> One of the roles that art can play is that of offering scenarios for ‘worlds under construction’ and of subverting technologies for the purpose of creating contestable objects. This role of art makes the emergence of the semi-livings as evocative art ‘objects’ and the multi-level exploration of their use so relevant and important. The Tissue Culture & Art Project (TC&A), was set up by us (Oron Catts and Ionat Zurr) in 1996 to explore, develop and critique the use of tissue technologies for artistic ends. From the beginning, [http://www.uoc.edu/artnodes/6/dt/eng/catts_zurr.pdf TC&A has been interested] on a practical level in investigating human relationships with the different gradients of life through the construction and growth of a new class of objects/beings -- that of the semi-living. The semi-living form parts of complex organisms which are sustained alive outside of the body, and which are [http://www.culturemachine.net/index.php/cm/article/view/30/37 coerced to grow in predetermined shapes]. These evocative objects are a tangible example that brings into question our deep-rooted perceptions of life, identity and selfhood, and the position of the human with regard to other living beings and the environment. We are interested in the new discourses and the new ethics, epistemology and ontology opened up by issues of partial life and by the contestable future scenarios these partial life forms are offering us. With this, we have relied on and developed some new ways of growing tissue by using and subverting scientific tools and techniques from almost a hundred years ago to the present. <br><br> As discussed briefly earlier, one of the more interesting interpretations, and definitely the most post-anthropocentric perspective on the existence of the HeLa cell line, comes from a scientist, Leigh Van Valen. Van Valen controversially suggested to his peers that the HeLa cell line was an embodiment of a new taxonomical branch -- that it was a new species of its kind. Due to its ability to replicate indefinitely, and its non-human chromosome number, Leigh Van Valen described HeLa as an example of the contemporary creation of a new species, ''Helacyton gartleri''. It was named after Stanley M. Gartler, whom Van Valen credits with discovering ‘the remarkable success of this species’.[VI] His argument for speciation depends on three points: • The chromosomal incompatibility of HeLa cells with humans, which makes them non-human. • Their ecological niche, which may be technologically dependent, but we can assert that many species, including humans to a large extent, are by now technologically dependent. • Their ability to persist and expand well beyond the intentions and imaginations of human cultivators. <br><br> Scientific knowledge leads to shifts in the perception of life: life is becoming a raw material, while biology is turning into engineering. Whenever life and technology mix, odd things happen. Where does lab-grown and engineered life fit in the human taxonomy? In tissue banks that provide cell lines, one starts to find all sorts of oddities: cells that have three different organisms as its origins, or fused cells of human and mouse origin. These cells are only classified by catalogue numbers or by very unusual names. This is what we can describe as neolife. More and more museums have started to collect fragments of life; frozen cells that represent the whole. Here, the technology of collection is converging with the technology of making strange. The old ways of privileging form (staffed idealised forms of animals) are been replaced with information and fragments on display. New life forms are entering collections, but the collection is not complete -- the ‘odd neolife’ is not part of our natural history collections, as the lab-grown, lab-modified life forms are still absent from it. Our''[http://tcaproject.org/projects/noark/neolifism Odd Ne]''[http://tcaproject.org/projects/noark/neolifism ''olifism''] is an updated cabinet of curiosities. Museums have their own conventions with regard to displaying preserved life forms. In the ''Odd Neolifism'' display, ideas about a progressive complexity of species are questioned. At the far end of the display we have included the only living element -- cell tissue within a bioreactor (a surrogate, technological body). These life forms are so abstracted from their source and yet they are growing. Perhaps it is time to realise that we need to find a place in our ecology for neolife. <br><br> A pattern, even if somewhat blurry and ever changing, may be observed among the different examples of the semi-living. It is manifest in [http://tcaproject.org/ the desire to sense as well as make sense of a situation that is post-anthropocentric and in the attempt to articulate the relation and interdependency of all living parts along the continuum of life and technology], through the intriguing and perplexing example of the in-between – the semi-living. This opens up new discourses about the different relationships we might form with these neolife forms, allowing us to shed new light on our perception of life. Such entities might eventually become fetishised, or even become our 'natural-ish' companions, thus invading and replacing our constructed and manufactured environments with [http://www.tca.uwa.edu.au/publication/THE_AESTHETICS_OF_CARE.pdf growing, moving, soft, moist, and care-needing things].		<br> '''Semi-Living Art and Neolife''' <br><br> One of the roles that art can play is that of offering scenarios for ‘worlds under construction’ and of subverting technologies for the purpose of creating contestable objects. This role of art makes the emergence of the semi-livings as evocative art ‘objects’ and the multi-level exploration of their use so relevant and important. The Tissue Culture & Art Project (TC&A), was set up by us (Oron Catts and Ionat Zurr) in 1996 to explore, develop and critique the use of tissue technologies for artistic ends. From the beginning, [http://www.uoc.edu/artnodes/6/dt/eng/catts_zurr.pdf TC&A has been interested] on a practical level in investigating human relationships with the different gradients of life through the construction and growth of a new class of objects/beings -- that of the semi-living. The semi-living form parts of complex organisms which are sustained alive outside of the body, and which are [http://www.culturemachine.net/index.php/cm/article/view/30/37 coerced to grow in predetermined shapes]. These evocative objects are a tangible example that brings into question our deep-rooted perceptions of life, identity and selfhood, and the position of the human with regard to other living beings and the environment. We are interested in the new discourses and the new ethics, epistemology and ontology opened up by issues of partial life and by the contestable future scenarios these partial life forms are offering us. With this, we have relied on and developed some new ways of growing tissue by using and subverting scientific tools and techniques from almost a hundred years ago to the present. <br><br> As discussed briefly earlier, one of the more interesting interpretations, and definitely the most post-anthropocentric perspective on the existence of the HeLa cell line, comes from a scientist, Leigh Van Valen. Van Valen controversially suggested to his peers that the HeLa cell line was an embodiment of a new taxonomical branch -- that it was a new species of its kind. Due to its ability to replicate indefinitely, and its non-human chromosome number, Leigh Van Valen described HeLa as an example of the contemporary creation of a new species, ''Helacyton gartleri''. It was named after Stanley M. Gartler, whom Van Valen credits with discovering ‘the remarkable success of this species’.[VI] His argument for speciation depends on three points: • The chromosomal incompatibility of HeLa cells with humans, which makes them non-human. • Their ecological niche, which may be technologically dependent, but we can assert that many species, including humans to a large extent, are by now technologically dependent. • Their ability to persist and expand well beyond the intentions and imaginations of human cultivators. <br><br> Scientific knowledge leads to shifts in the perception of life: life is becoming a raw material, while biology is turning into engineering. Whenever life and technology mix, odd things happen. Where does lab-grown and engineered life fit in the human taxonomy? In tissue banks that provide cell lines, one starts to find all sorts of oddities: cells that have three different organisms as its origins, or fused cells of human and mouse origin. These cells are only classified by catalogue numbers or by very unusual names. This is what we can describe as neolife. More and more museums have started to collect fragments of life; frozen cells that represent the whole. Here, the technology of collection is converging with the technology of making strange. The old ways of privileging form (staffed idealised forms of animals) are been replaced with information and fragments on display. New life forms are entering collections, but the collection is not complete -- the ‘odd neolife’ is not part of our natural history collections, as the lab-grown, lab-modified life forms are still absent from it. Our''[http://tcaproject.org/projects/noark/neolifism Odd Ne]''[http://tcaproject.org/projects/noark/neolifism ''olifism''] is an updated cabinet of curiosities. Museums have their own conventions with regard to displaying preserved life forms. In the ''Odd Neolifism'' display, ideas about a progressive complexity of species are questioned. At the far end of the display we have included the only living element -- cell tissue within a bioreactor (a surrogate, technological body). These life forms are so abstracted from their source and yet they are growing. Perhaps it is time to realise that we need to find a place in our ecology for neolife. <br><br> A pattern, even if somewhat blurry and ever changing, may be observed among the different examples of the semi-living. It is manifest in [http://tcaproject.org/ the desire to sense as well as make sense of a situation that is post-anthropocentric and in the attempt to articulate the relation and interdependency of all living parts along the continuum of life and technology], through the intriguing and perplexing example of the in-between – the semi-living. This opens up new discourses about the different relationships we might form with these neolife forms, allowing us to shed new light on our perception of life. Such entities might eventually become fetishised, or even become our 'natural-ish' companions, thus invading and replacing our constructed and manufactured environments with [http://www.tca.uwa.edu.au/publication/THE_AESTHETICS_OF_CARE.pdf growing, moving, soft, moist, and care-needing things].
			<br><br>
			'''Notes'''
			<br><br>
			1 http://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/cell+fusion
			<br><br>
			2 http://www.medterms.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=32440
			<br><br>
			'''References'''
			<br><br>
			Davey, M. R., Clothier, R. H., Balls, M. & Cocking, E. E. (1978) 'An ultrastructural study of the fusion of cultured amphibian cells with higher plant protoplasts', ''Protoplasma'', 96:1-2, 157-172.
			<br><br>
			Harris, H. (2005) 'Roots: Cell Fusion', ''BioEssays'', 2:4, 176-179.

Partial life/Introduction - Revision history

Joanna at 12:36, 25 February 2012

Joanna at 12:32, 25 February 2012

Joanna at 12:23, 25 February 2012

Pw: Unprotected "Partial life/Introduction"

Pw: Protected "Partial life/Introduction" ([edit=sysop] (indefinite) [move=sysop] (indefinite))

Joanna at 16:36, 30 September 2011

Joanna at 18:17, 21 September 2011

Joanna at 18:15, 21 September 2011

Joanna at 18:01, 21 September 2011

Joanna at 17:58, 21 September 2011