LIFE INDUSTRIES SERIES, 2009-2010

On one of NPR’s Science Friday programs, there was a discussion of the viability of auto assembly in manufacturing. The basic principle being, that providing the correct recipe and environment, one could construct a computer or other complex machine by just providing the right variables and setting them in motion. I was particularly struck by how this happens in the form of life, with fertilized eggs following local rules of chemical interaction that eventually leads to a complex living fetus. In “Life Industries”, I am exploring the idea of products that are living things, manufactured and marketed, the necessary construction being merely code that explains a sequence of events to make the organism viable. The various products are labeled according to their product name/number and the periodic elements on which they are based.

These Life Products are based on either Carbon, Silicon, or Nitrogen-Phosphorous bases, and are potential colonists of other worlds, transmittable by pulses of information that cause the necessary sequence of events for life to begin. The series includes gouache paintings and silkscreens to mimic mid-century product advertisements, sculptures that will be displayed as if a specimen in a natural history museum, and a mockumentary about the inner workings and developments inside Life Industries.