Archive for the ‘cybord’ tag

BIOLOGICAL REMIX

TOPIC CHANGE: FROM COPYRIGHT TO BIOLOGICAL REMIX

Having spent the weekend plotting on how to find a specific point of entry in the huge topic of Creativity and Copyright – I stumbled upon on a topic that caught my attention. When discussing remix, we naturally stumble upon the role of the creator(s). The original creator whose creations are remixed by another. And one of the many arguments connected to the controversy in terms of dealing with copyright lies in whether the creator of the remix contributes with something orginal, or is merely mixing existing content.

I stumbled upong the life and work of Genesis P.Orrige and his/hers ongoing project of becoming the pandrogyne Genesis Breyer P.Orrige. In an interview s/he talks about connection between body and identity.

Reading this I started to think of the lastest work of the bio artist Eduardo Kac cleverly named The natural history of the Enigma, a bio art project centered around the plantimal Edunia. The Edunia came into being after Eduardo Kac introduced a gene from his DNA into the red blood veins of a Petunia. The Edunia is fertile. Kac thus argues that this remix is natural – since nature allows it.

With these initial examples in mind I will explore the realm of biological remix compared to cultural remix, focusing the role of the creator. What is originality in a cultural remix context versus a natural context. Do any of the rules/laws that applies to the cultural remix world apply here?

Obviously this can adressed from many angles. Think about hybrids, cyborgs, bio engineering, animal breeding practises, transsexuals, androids even AI.

So onto the first step: What has been written about this so far? Any interesting discourses?