Symbiosis: Sculpting the Art of Living Together

July 9, 2022
Presented by CultureHub and Navel LA in collaboration with SUPERCOLLIDER and the UCLA ArtSci Center

 

In Symbiosis: Sculpting the Art of Living Together, seven Los Angeles-based artists explored the relationship between distant mediums: art and biological sciences. These artists took inspiration from sources such as the ocean, animal exoskeletons, and the human body to challenge the way these disciplines intersect and unite through technology.

This event featured the following works of art:

Sasha Fishman's Flatlands, Gush, Shrimp, Ice and All at Once which investigates marine biomaterial extraction, toxicology, and genetic engineering as points for critical analysis and mechanisms for sculpting.

Erin Cooney's The Waves, which offers a defamiliarized visual and sonic experience of ocean waves by mirroring and transforming the waves into a sort of creature endowed with agency.

Isabel Beavers' Nocturne: Sea Altar, which honors the ocean through a multimedia installation incorporating audio, audio-reactive visuals, and light sculptures.

Ibuki Kuramochi metamorphoses her body digitally into various forms beyond time and space in her compositions Orgasmic Flesh, Filamin, and Cavum oris.

Ivana Dama explores the idea of playing a musical instrument with your eyes using custom pupil-tracking software in Command and Control.

Emma Akmakdijian's Weaving Threads video performance and installation of woven found fibers, bull kelp, and animal fibers considers the complex land and sea ecosystems of these co-creators.

Iman Person's New Air considers interspecies communication through the medium of air and video, and activates new channels for heightened human sensitivity to the environment.

This exhibition also featured a workshop by Sasha Fishman, titled Timekeepers. Fishman had various solutions of chitosan mixed with vinegar that participants could pour into disposable petri dishes to make bioplastics. Participants could then mix dyes made from spirulina into their plastic while it's still a liquid and utilize various shells from shrimp and cicadas that could be mixed in for textural differences.


ARTISTS
Emma Akmakdijian, Isabel Beavers, Erin Cooney, Ivana Dama, Sasha Fishman, Ibuki Kuramochi, Iman Person

CULTUREHUB LA
Yujin Iris Jeong – Creative Producer
Hannah Jo – Production Coordinator
Joe Kananack – Event Coordinator
Camille Weins – Creative Technologist


프로젝트