Amplifying Ambiguities: Art on the Fringes of Biotechnology

Since the 1980s, bioart has emerged as an important art form alongside the transition to the 21st century, often described, both optimistically and ominously, as the “biotech century.” This doctoral dissertation studies artists’ engagements with wet biotechnologies, considering bioart in relation to the related approaches of DIYbio and biodesign. The thesis navigates the tension between bioart’s topical and methodological relationship to biotechnology and its claims to some other aesthetic quality defining it as art. What is the specificity of bioart in relation to related phenomena on the topic of biotechnology? The author contends that bioart is a heterogeneous field that is, in important ways, singular as an artistic approach to the biotechnosciences, while simultaneously being closely interlinked with DIYbio and biodesign, as well as biotechnology and the art world. This thesis is based on a case study performed at the SymbioticA Centre for Excellency in Biological Arts, supplemented by participant observation in numerous other contexts, including community laboratories, workshops, visits to exhibitions and conversations with practitioners of bioart, DIYbio and biology.