Interactive multimedia Installation
2018
2018
Plasticization Clinic II, was created as part of Guerrilla Science’s 2018 ArtSci Residency in collaboration with Oregon State University, Pratt Institute, and the National Science Foundation, and exhibited at Figment NYC on Governors Island, New York in June of 2018. Plasticization Clinic II functioned as GLEI Inc.’s second pop-up clinic, pastiching the similar real installations funded by boutique biomedical firms. For this iteration of the work, GLEI Inc. conducted onsite research and public outreach in the hopes of engineering a more advanced, evolved, and in turn, plasticized, human genome. I, along with three additional artists, performed as laboratory technicians and with participants on a direct and personal level taking them through each aspect of the testing process, from filling out medical information, to the collection of their saliva, and lastly, having their photo taken. The lab technicians were also responsible for providing both factual and fictive information regarding plastic pollution and the effects on the human body, blurring the lines between the Clinic as a medical pop-up and an art installation. Although the project began as a commentary on ecological downfall and the effects on human life, it developed into a forum to examine public trust in medical corporations. This interaction ignited critical discussion of corporate authority over the individual in terms of medical care, the rise of DNA collection through ancestry based organizations, and the willingness of the public to freely provide the most vital part of their biological fingerprint to medical companies and fictive corporations alike.