Visual Art News - Criticism: August 2008 Archives

The famed glass artist gave a talk and presentation recently at Google’s speakers series in California. Chihuly is widely recognized for his distinct work. His Gardens of Glass series has been exhibited in municipal botanical gardens throughout the country. The Columbia Museum of Art will open a new exhibit of Chihuly’s works called Seaforms, showcasing about 35 works and preliminary sketches of shells within shells, and other forms inspired by the ocean, which he worked on over a 14-year period. That show begins Sept. 5.

On Tuesday, I mused a bit about how scientists have a lot to say about the arts, but artists don’t seem to have much to say about science. I still believe that’s true, but that’s certainly not a categorical statement, as I concede from the beginning. That said, there is a growing field of artists examining the possibilities of what’s being called “biotech art” or “bioart.” I’m not convinced we know what that actually means yet, but it has to do with this notion of cross-pollination that I talked about. From what I can tell from a quick tour around the internet, this movement is small but based on what I’ve seen, it’s really stunning — and disturbing. A good place to start is a report by Slate that ran this time last year. It’s a slideshow of some of these “bioartists.” The above image is by Adam Brandej. His website, called Genpets.com, is scathing and captivating parody of biotechnology.