[ISEA2016] Artists Talk: Maite Cajaraville & Gisle Froysland — From DNA to NSA

Artists Statement

Abstract
The Icelandic government granted the rights to scan the DNA of all its citizens to the company deCODE genetics, Inc. This company believes that the Icelandic model for it’s inhabitants mixed with other phenotypes can be of great interest in the study of certain mental illnesses like schizophrenia etc … To avoid bankruptcy the Icelandic company later goes on the market reaching $ 485 million worth by integrating international “joint venture” investment companies. After various phases, the Icelandic data is passed to a Chinese mining company which is currently marketing Icelandic DNA information with the restrictions and rules ofanonymity. We can think of many rabbit holes here: What is the market value of your DNA? What is the DNA business model? What benefits did the Icelandic state receive from it’s “deal” with the company deCODE? What are the implications when the data can be inherited by subsequent companies? Will China copy the model of Icelandic DNA and create blond cyborgs, with blue eyes and Icelandic mentality?We will talk about our Project “From DNA to NSA, an action-intervention based on DIY bio laboratory to extract DNA strings from the visitors and data visualization and sonification of human DNA.

Project Description
From DNA to NSA is an action intervention and a data visualization and sonification of human DNA. It consists on setting up a DIY bio laboratory to extract DNA strings from the visitors. Using common, domestic products, audience can follow an easy DIY process and experience how their DNA strings looks like. The DIY biolab serves as a proof of how easy your privacy can be broken.Visitors, once they finalize the 5 steps can choose to blend their genetic material with the others visitors formulating a new common DNA. A blender is set up at the exhibition space. Meanwhile, public DNA records from an internet database is compared to one of the genomas from the Icelandic DNA database, and the results are visualized and sonified, at different monitors and audio system.

  • Gisle Frøysland studied computer science, information science, TV production and arts in Bergen, Norway. Since the early 80s he has been working as a musician, VJ and visual artist. He is a founding member of BEK – the Bergen Centre for Electronic Art and initiator/director of the Piksel festival for free technologies in artistic practice. Frøysland’s work is an inquiry into what he himself calls the “hype traps that the computer and media industry wants us to believe in”. In pieces like “Dodonews” and “the FaceBot”, he turns these traps into dialogic scenes, thereby revealing hidden power structures and presumptions. The dislocations of Frøysland form a media critique that questions not only the cybernetics of the net but also its utopian claim; neither browsing nor digital interpretation can free itself from contextual references Gisle Frøysland has been the receiver of grants and has held numerous exhibitions, many of them in Norway but also abroad. His work has been presented at several international festivals like Electrohype, Dissonanze, Transmediale, Borealis, Ultima, MakeArt, Pixelache, Mal au Pixel and Electropixel. His past collaborators include KKNull, Emi Maeda, VuNhatTan, John Hegre, Lasse Marhaug, BAKtruppen and Motherboard. piksel.org/~gif
  • Maite Cajaraville (Spain) With a focus on interdisciplinary art, video creation and digital art, Cajaraville combines her artistic production with curatorial commissions and cultural management projects. She is one of the founder member of LaptopsRus / CrisisRus, a women performers network, together with Shu Lea Cheang and Lucía Egaña. At the 90’s Cajaraville built up the spanish node (Conexión.madrid) of the pioneer International City Network, which connected EU artists through internet. Cajaraville has been exhibited wildly internationally. Selected exhibitions include “NSA” at the French Institute, Cameroon, “NETSCOPIO” at Laboratory Arte Alameda, Mexico DF, “A Vladi Tale”, at Vladicáucaso, Russian Federation, “G.O.D, Garden of Delights”, at Media Facades European Festival, “MEETING|REUNION” at Museo Nacional de Arte Reina Sofía, Medialab-Prado and Matadero Madrid in 2010. Her video works has been shown at the Venice Biennale, Museo Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, MACBA in Barcelona and Fundación Telefónica. Maite Cajaraville teachs Media Art at the Camilo Jose Cela University under the Film Studies Degree. maitecajaraville.org

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