BioArt program at Rensselaer among first of its kind in the United States

Troy, N.Y. — Thanks to a new program in BioArt, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s next generation of artists may find inspiration in a seemingly unlikely place — the petri dish. A joint collaboration between faculty in the Center for Biotechnology and Interdisciplinary Studies (CBIS) and the School of Humanities and Social Sciences’ Arts Department, the initiative seeks to fuse Rensselaer’s world-class scientific research with its cutting-edge electronic arts.

An emerging discipline dedicated to exploring and employing the life sciences through artistic means, BioArt can take a variety of forms, ranging from paintings made with living cells to sculptures created out of tissue cultures to performance art pieces that incorporate the human body. The common goal across the BioArt landscape is to promote public understanding, awareness, and critical reflection of highly complex, often misinterpreted scientific practices. 

The program is modeled after successful BioArt programs abroad, including SymbioticA, an artistic laboratory dedicated to the research, learning, and critique of life sciences located within the University of Western Australia. 

“Through ongoing art and research exhibitions open to the public, the BioArt program at Rensselaer will bridge the arts and sciences in a very real, very tangible way,” said Kathy High, head of the Arts Department and one of three faculty members leading the initiative. “I see the discipline as a way to allow all people to feel involved and participate in the advances made in biotechnology.” 

In today’s society, where scientific breakthroughs are ever-evolving, High says BioArt “gives people the opportunity to stop and look at both the risks and the rewards of scientific advances.”

Robert Linhardt, the Ann and John H. Broadbent, Jr. ’59 Senior Constellation Professor of Biocatalysis and Metabolic Engineering and acting director of Rensselaer’s CBIS, and Rich Pell, assistant professor of the arts, will lead the initiative along with High.

The group will work together to form interdisciplinary duos consisting of interested faculty members, graduate students, and senior undergraduate students from the arts and sciences that will create a work of art together in the lab. This approach will “allow artists to engage with the cutting-edge scientific research being conducted in the Center for Biotechnology and Interdisciplinary Studies and connect researchers to a broader cultural dialogue relating to their work,” according to Pell.

The CBIS will host an ongoing public exhibition program, featuring BioArt created both at Rensselaer and around the world. Artist Daniela Kostova — a 2005 graduate from Rensselaer’s Electronic Arts program — has been appointed as curator-in-residence and will facilitate and manage the exhibition program, as well as a visiting lecturer/researcher program with an emphasis on public presentations and public education. 

“Certainly, scientists and engineers often have a difficult time communicating complex concepts to the general public, due in part due to the very technical language of scientific research,” said Linhardt. “The artist speaks a universal language that can better connect the public to scientific and engineering concepts in a more accessible manner.”

“Sentimental Objects in Attempts to Befriend a Virus,” one of the first BioArt exhibitions of the fall semester, will begin on Oct. 29. Artist Caitlin Berrigan will be distributing chocolate truffles shaped into the molecular structure of the hepatitis c virus from a geo-dome located in the CBIS atrium. The exhibit will run for one week.

According to the artist, “desire to eat the enticing chocolates is mixed with a repulsion for the infectious virus. This unnerving dialectic has proven to be an exciting and approachable way to ignite discussion and create awareness about an extremely prevalent and underrepresented disease.”

To craft the confections, the Berrigan created a plaster model of the hepatitis virus from a 3-D illustration printed as a rapid prototype.

The BioArt initiative was funded through a seed grant administered through Rensselaer’s Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center (EMPAC). The Center for Biotechnology and Interdisciplinary Studies provided additional support.

Contact: Amber Cleveland
Phone: (518) 276-2146
E-mail: clevea@rpi.edu