2019
nutrient agar in petri dishes, epoxy resin, mosaic
Art Prototypes is a multilayered bioart installation that explores the symbiosis between basic forms of life and art. The work is divided in two phases:
The first one consists of petri dishes, left open in places that are essential to the artist’s everyday life – her workspace, her home, the public places she visits. While staying open, the petri dishes capture microorganisms from the air. After a certain period of time, they grow in the dish and create colonies. The result is a beautiful collection of microstructures – bacteria, fungus, mold. Using the living layer as a basis, the artist creates micro mosaic structures on top of them, which respond to the colors, shapes and sizes of the colonies. The art structures come to ‘extend’ and to try to visually rethink what life has created.
In the second phase the mosaic structures are the first to be put in the petri dish and the microorganisms that grow afterwards are found (quite literally) on the art layer. The life that grows on top of it is found on the art itself – thus the project explores the hidden micro life of art itself.
As a result, both life and art share the same living space – changing the position of ‘the first’ to dwell the place. Is art an extension of life or is life an extension of art? Or is that an endless process of rethinking and searching for answers?
