Alternative Anatomies – with Stelarc & Nina Sellars
24 September 2017 | LIBRARY London, London, UK
Virtual Futures presents Stelarc and Nina Sellars for a discussion on collaboration in artistic practice and the influence of anatomy on our understanding of body, identity and subjectivity.
Stelarc explores alternate anatomical architectures, interrogating issues of agency, identity and the posthuman. He has performed with a Third Hand, a Stomach Sculpture and Exoskeleton, a 6-legged walking robot. Fractal Flesh, Ping Body and Parasite are internet performances that explore remote and involuntary choreography. He is surgically constructing and stem-cell growing an ear on his arm that will be internet enabled. In 1996 he was made an Honorary Professor of Art and Robotics at Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh and in 2002 was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Laws by Monash University, Melbourne. In 2010 was awarded the Ars Electronica Hybrid Arts Prize. In 2015 he received the Australia Council’s Emerging and Experimental Arts Award. In 2016 he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from the Ionian University, Corfu. Stelarc is currently a Distinguished Research Fellow, School of Design and Art, Curtin University. His artwork is represented by Scott Livesey Galleries, Melbourne.
Nina Sellars is an artist whose practice works across the disciplines of art, science and humanities, and focuses on the way anatomy has shaped our understanding of the body, identity and subjectivity over the centuries. Her interest in anatomy has taken her from working in art studios and wet anatomy labs to working in physics labs and medical imaging facilities – here she critically engages with the cultural implications of anatomy. Essentially, Sellars questions how concepts of anatomy appear meaningful to us in the 21st century. Currently, Sellars is artist in residence at SymbioticA, biological arts laboratory, University of Western Australia, where she is undertaking research in tissue culture techniques in development of her arts project – Fat Culture. Fat Culture incorporates human fat grown in vitro (aka adipose tissue culture) and is funded by the Australia Council.
In partnership with the Victoria & Albert Museum‘s Digital Design Weekend: a weekend of free events exploring technology, making and collaboration, coinciding with the London Design Festival.