Re: [-empyre-] living bodies differently

[High, Kathy]

--empyre- soft-skinned space--
Hi Tarsh,

You said:
So here is the main point of my work, I guess: If bodies sometimes
irritate or kill their hosts, what, if any, response-ability (to borrow
from Astrid Schrader) does that host have to those bodies? If we cant
get rid of them, how do we live with them? Can we live our bodies
differently?

I, too have been thinking about these questions quite a lot a I have been
working with 

the gut microbiome as of late. And this question has come up a lot for me.
And I ofter ask myself,
am I a host, or am I a vessel? I am not sure anymore. When I make bad
decisions (drinking to much,
Eating sweets, etc.) is it me not taking responsibility for my micro biome
friends/frenemies - or
Are my actions the result of their ³desires² prompting me to make these
choices?
Frankly, these days - I am not sure who is driving this thing we call a
bodyŠ

But these questions amaze meŠ many thanks, Kathy

On 28/02/2017, 9:44 PM, "empyre-boun...@lists.artdesign.unsw.edu.au on
behalf of Tarsh Bates"  wrote:

>--empyre- soft-skinned space--
>Thanks for the intro Renate and thanks to Paul, Lindsay, Byron and Kathy
>for your fascinating discussions.
>
>I am currently working on my PhD in biological art at SymbioticA. My
>research is focused on the human body as an ecology. This project has
>raised quite a few physical, metaphysical, aesthetic and ethical
>questions, such as: how do we think of the self if we are multiple, do
>we treat our bodies differently if we think of ourselves as hosts, can
>thinking of ourselves as ecologies change how we treat our external
>ecologies, how do the participants in the human ecology perceive their
>ecology/environment, can we understand "what it might be like to be a
>[member of this ecology]", can we understand bodies differently . I work
>with /Candida albicans, /which is one of the species of this ecology and
>usually much maligned as "thrush" or "yeast infection". I make artworks
>with this yeast, using scientific and artistic experimental tools and
>methods, for human consumption.
>
>Although I am interested in the philosophical aesthetic tradition, such
>as Kant and Nietzsche, I am much more interested in materialist
>aesthetic experiences, in the sensuality and eros of encounters as a
>more-than-human. Phenomenology doesnt work well for CandidaHomo
>entanglements, as consciousness is irrelevant. Sarah Ahmed's
>"orientation" and Karen Barad's queer performativity are more
>interesting here. The two main questions I am working with are 1. how to
>understand the other that is self - Barad's intra-active phenomena have
>been helpful here where there is no ontological difference; and 2. how
>to understand the "self-other" who doesnt have a face, who is not
>similar. Empathy based on similarity or vision doesnt apply to
>CandidaHomo relations. Bodies are all.
>
>So here is the main point of my work, I guess: If bodies sometimes
>irritate or kill their hosts, what, if any, response-ability (to borrow
>from Astrid Schrader) does that host have to those bodies? If we cant
>get rid of them, how do we live with them? Can we live our bodies
>differently?
>
>
>Tarsh Bates
>
>PhD (Biological Art) Candidate SymbioticA, The University of Western
>Australia
>
>w: tarshbates.com 
>
>On 28/02/2017 10:29 AM, Renate Terese Ferro wrote:
>> --empyre- soft-skinned space--
>> Thank you Paul for your incredibly thoughtful response which really
>>helped me to understand specifically what your meant by ethics.  I¹m
>>going to let you also respond to Erin, but I hope you won¹t mind that I
>>introduce our last three guests just a bit early.  I thought it might be
>>interesting to bring in Tarsh Bates, Antoinette LaFarge, and Margherita
>>Pevere who will join you Paul and hopefully anyone else out there (Erin,
>>Kathy, Byron) who also might want to join Paul on this thread of ethics.
>> Just a note that we will keep this discussion open through Sunday.
>>Welcome and thanks.
>>
>> Biographies:
>> Tarsh Bates (AU) Tarsh Bates is an artist/researcher/educator
>>interested in how knowledge and experience form and transfer through the
>>relationships between material, bodies, environment and
>> culture. She completed a Master of Science (Biological Arts) in 2012
>>and has worked variously as a pizza delivery driver, a fruit and
>>vegetable stacker, a toilet paper packer, a researcher in compost
>>science and waste management, a honeybee ejaculator, an art gallery
>>invigilator, a raspberry picker, a lecturer/tutor in art/science, art
>>history, gender & technology, posthumanism, counter realism and pop
>>culture, an editor, a bookkeeper, a car detailer, and a life drawing
>>model. She is currently a candidate for a PhD (Biological Arts) at
>>SymbioticA UWA where her research is concerned the
>> aesthetics of interspecies relationships and the human as a
>>multispecies ecology. She

[-empyre-] living bodies differently

[Tarsh Bates]

--empyre- soft-skinned space--
Thanks for the intro and invite Renate and thanks to the wonderful 
artists for your fascinating discussions.


I am currently working on my PhD in biological art at SymbioticA. My 
research is focused on the human body as an ecology. This project has 
raised quite a few physical, metaphysical, aesthetic and ethical 
questions, such as: how do we think of the self if we are multiple, do 
we treat our bodies differently if we think of ourselves as hosts, can 
thinking of ourselves as ecologies change how we treat our external 
ecologies, how do the participants in the human ecology perceive their 
ecology/environment, can we understand "what it might be like to be a 
[member of this ecology]", can we understand bodies differently . I work 
with /Candida albicans, /which is one of the species of this ecology and 
usually much maligned as "thrush" or "yeast infection". I make artworks 
with this yeast, using scientific and artistic experimental tools and 
methods, for human consumption.


Although I am interested in the philosophical aesthetic tradition, such 
as Kant and Nietzsche, I am much more interested in materialist 
aesthetic experiences, in the sensuality and eros of encounters as a 
more-than-human. Phenomenology doesnt work well for CandidaHomo 
entanglements, as consciousness is irrelevant. Sarah Ahmed's 
"orientation" and Karen Barad's queer performativity are more 
interesting here. The two main questions I am working with are 1. how to 
understand the other that is self - Barad's intra-active phenomena have 
been helpful here where there is no ontological difference; and 2. how 
to understand the "self-other" who doesnt have a face, who is not 
similar. Empathy based on similarity or vision doesnt apply to 
CandidaHomo relations. Bodies are all.


So here is the main point of my work, I guess: If bodies sometimes 
irritate or kill their hosts, what, if any, response-ability (to borrow 
from Astrid Schrader) does that host have to those bodies? If we cant 
get rid of them, how do we live with them? Can we live our bodies 
differently?



Tarsh Bates

PhD (Biological Art) Candidate SymbioticA, The University of Western 
Australia


w: tarshbates.com 

On 28/02/2017 10:29 AM, Renate Terese Ferro wrote:

--empyre- soft-skinned space--
Thank you Paul for your incredibly thoughtful response which really 
helped me to understand specifically what your meant by ethics.  I’m 
going to let you also respond to Erin, but I hope you won’t mind that 
I introduce our last three guests just a bit early.  I thought it 
might be interesting to bring in Tarsh Bates, Antoinette LaFarge, and 
Margherita Pevere who will join you Paul and hopefully anyone else out 
there (Erin, Kathy, Byron) who also might want to join Paul on this 
thread of ethics.  Just a note that we will keep this discussion open 
through Sunday.  Welcome and thanks.


Biographies:
Tarsh Bates (AU) Tarsh Bates is an artist/researcher/educator 
interested in how knowledge and experience form and transfer through 
the relationships between material, bodies, environment and
culture. She completed a Master of Science (Biological Arts) in 2012 
and has worked variously as a pizza delivery driver, a fruit and 
vegetable stacker, a toilet paper packer, a researcher in compost 
science and waste management, a honeybee ejaculator, an art gallery 
invigilator, a raspberry picker, a lecturer/tutor in art/science, art 
history, gender & technology, posthumanism, counter realism and pop 
culture, an editor, a bookkeeper, a car detailer, and a life drawing 
model. She is currently a candidate for a PhD (Biological Arts) at 
SymbioticA UWA where her research is concerned the
aesthetics of interspecies relationships and the human as a 
multispecies ecology. She is particularly enamoured with Candida 
albicans.


Antoinette LaFarge is an artist and writer whose beat is virtuality 
and its discontents. She has a special interest in avatarism, expanded 
narrative, and feminist techno-arts. Recent publications include 
“Pseudo Space: Experiments with Avatarism and Telematic Performance in 
Social Media” (MIT Press, 2016) and “Social Proxies and Real-World 
Avatars: Impersonation as a Mode of Capitalist Production” (Art 
Journal, 2014. Recent new media performance and installation projects 
include Far-Flung follows function (2013), Galileo in America (2012), 
and Hangmen
Also Die (2010). She is currently working on projects centered on 
resurfacing work by women innovators and botanical artists of the late 
19th century. She is on the faculty of the Art Department at UC 
Irvine. Deeply fascinated by biological processes,


Margherita Pevere (DE/FI) is a visual artist and researcher 
investigating decay and transformation as they are common destiny of 
human and non-human matter. Her practice features a unique combination 
of organic and technological mate

[-empyre-] living bodies differently

[Tarsh Bates]

--empyre- soft-skinned space--
Thanks for the intro Renate and thanks to Paul, Lindsay, Byron and Kathy 
for your fascinating discussions.


I am currently working on my PhD in biological art at SymbioticA. My 
research is focused on the human body as an ecology. This project has 
raised quite a few physical, metaphysical, aesthetic and ethical 
questions, such as: how do we think of the self if we are multiple, do 
we treat our bodies differently if we think of ourselves as hosts, can 
thinking of ourselves as ecologies change how we treat our external 
ecologies, how do the participants in the human ecology perceive their 
ecology/environment, can we understand "what it might be like to be a 
[member of this ecology]", can we understand bodies differently . I work 
with /Candida albicans, /which is one of the species of this ecology and 
usually much maligned as "thrush" or "yeast infection". I make artworks 
with this yeast, using scientific and artistic experimental tools and 
methods, for human consumption.


Although I am interested in the philosophical aesthetic tradition, such 
as Kant and Nietzsche, I am much more interested in materialist 
aesthetic experiences, in the sensuality and eros of encounters as a 
more-than-human. Phenomenology doesnt work well for CandidaHomo 
entanglements, as consciousness is irrelevant. Sarah Ahmed's 
"orientation" and Karen Barad's queer performativity are more 
interesting here. The two main questions I am working with are 1. how to 
understand the other that is self - Barad's intra-active phenomena have 
been helpful here where there is no ontological difference; and 2. how 
to understand the "self-other" who doesnt have a face, who is not 
similar. Empathy based on similarity or vision doesnt apply to 
CandidaHomo relations. Bodies are all.


So here is the main point of my work, I guess: If bodies sometimes 
irritate or kill their hosts, what, if any, response-ability (to borrow 
from Astrid Schrader) does that host have to those bodies? If we cant 
get rid of them, how do we live with them? Can we live our bodies 
differently?



Tarsh Bates

PhD (Biological Art) Candidate SymbioticA, The University of Western 
Australia


w: tarshbates.com 

On 28/02/2017 10:29 AM, Renate Terese Ferro wrote:

--empyre- soft-skinned space--
Thank you Paul for your incredibly thoughtful response which really helped me 
to understand specifically what your meant by ethics.  I’m going to let you 
also respond to Erin, but I hope you won’t mind that I introduce our last three 
guests just a bit early.  I thought it might be interesting to bring in Tarsh 
Bates, Antoinette LaFarge, and Margherita Pevere who will join you Paul and 
hopefully anyone else out there (Erin, Kathy, Byron) who also might want to 
join Paul on this thread of ethics.  Just a note that we will keep this 
discussion open through Sunday.  Welcome and thanks.

Biographies:
Tarsh Bates (AU) Tarsh Bates is an artist/researcher/educator interested in how 
knowledge and experience form and transfer through the relationships between 
material, bodies, environment and
culture. She completed a Master of Science (Biological Arts) in 2012 and has worked 
variously as a pizza delivery driver, a fruit and vegetable stacker, a toilet paper 
packer, a researcher in compost science and waste management, a honeybee 
ejaculator, an art gallery invigilator, a raspberry picker, a lecturer/tutor in 
art/science, art history, gender & technology, posthumanism, counter realism 
and pop culture, an editor, a bookkeeper, a car detailer, and a life drawing model. 
She is currently a candidate for a PhD (Biological Arts) at SymbioticA UWA where 
her research is concerned the
aesthetics of interspecies relationships and the human as a multispecies 
ecology. She is particularly enamoured with Candida albicans.

Antoinette LaFarge is an artist and writer whose beat is virtuality and its 
discontents. She has a special interest in avatarism, expanded narrative, and 
feminist techno-arts. Recent publications include “Pseudo Space: Experiments 
with Avatarism and Telematic Performance in Social Media” (MIT Press, 2016) and 
“Social Proxies and Real-World Avatars: Impersonation as a Mode of Capitalist 
Production” (Art Journal, 2014. Recent new media performance and installation 
projects include Far-Flung follows function (2013), Galileo in America (2012), 
and Hangmen
Also Die (2010). She is currently working on projects centered on resurfacing 
work by women innovators and botanical artists of the late 19th century. She is 
on the faculty of the Art Department at UC Irvine. Deeply fascinated by 
biological processes,

Margherita Pevere (DE/FI) is a visual artist and researcher investigating decay 
and transformation as they are common destiny of human and non-human matter. 
Her practice features a unique combination of organic and technological 
materials: sh