swers—that they had not really considered the
ramifications.
There’s a chicken-or-egg issue: is bio art creating these ethical issues or simply commenting
on them? Artist Lucas Evers, who also heads the
open wet lab at the Waag Society in Amsterdam, believes the ethical issues raised in bio art
are merely a reflection of society’s issues. Like
good artists do, he and his colleagues are simply
bringing these issues up to the surface through
their works.
Others disagree. Unsurprisingly, PETA has
already gone on record as being against bio art.
Alka Chadna, a laboratory oversight specialist
at PETA, explained her organization’s stance.
”Fundamentally, animals are not art supplies,”
she says. “They are sentient beings who feel
pain, suffer, and value their lives just like we
do—and to exploit them for human ends is
wrong.
“Bio art that uses animals or parts of animals
who were killed for the art may parade itself
as some kind of social reflection or social commentary, but in actual fact, it embodies deliberate acts of violence perpetrated against animals.”
For some ethicists, this is almost a benign
issue. The famed Peter Singer declined to be interviewed for this piece, saying he “didn’t see it
as a big issue. The number of animals involved
is trivial compared to factory farming.” For
many people, there are bigger fish to fry—perhaps literally, if you’re not a member of PETA.
While some artists like Kac seem to deliberately flout these concerns in favor of a greater
aesthetic achievement, others seem willing to
engage. In fact, for Bok, the point of “Xenotext” is to bring up these concerns. “Art presents a kind of sandbox with which ethical issues can be experimented with, without fear of
repercussion,” he says.
“I’m merely proposing these conversations
that I think poetry should participate in,” says
Bok.
Evers agrees, saying art is a “necessary conduit” for exploring the moral shades of grey. On
the flip side, he also thinks “science sees bio art
as another form of science communications” in
which artists can play a role in explaining the
scientists’ perspective to the public.
“Learning about the natural world is a way to
creative reverence for it,” Anker says. “Given
the current state of global warming and pollution, bio art is a way to become more attuned to
the natural world by examining it in what might
be unnatural dimensions.”
One of the last things Anker showed me
during my visit to her lab was a set of cloned
poinsettias. There must have been at least two
dozen sitting in a small corner of the lab, under a greenhouse light. And to think they all
contained the same genetic information, even
though it clearly didn’t appear so.
I asked her what she was going to do with
all the plants. From what I had just seen, I had
expected some grand design that was going to
pinpoint the homogenization of 21st century
culture through the Internet or an emphasis on
the oneness of all living things. But her simple
reply was “I’m not so sure… I just like having
them around!”
Despite all the abstract discussion on aesthetics and artistic commentary, I had almost forgotten that some art was meant simply to present people with a pretty view. Bio art, too.
“Genetic engineering makes us think more
about the ease with which we manipulate organisms for aesthetic purposes,” says Bok.
“We’ve already manipulated genetics through
hundreds of years of agriculture and breeding. I
really think my participates within that legacy.”
12
SciArt in America February 2015