Waldby: responses to IMAGING IN ART AND SCIENCE

to comment on this post, click on "comments" below
to return to main page go to www.visualcultureandbioscience.org

From: Catherine Waldby
Date: Tue, 6 Mar 2007 18:15:02 +1100

Following on from Susan’s Squier’s and Michael Sappol’s points and in response to Suzanne’s requests for more examples, Brad Smith’s very touching and fascinating posting is a terrific example of what I was trying to get at (although not strictly an ‘art’ context). The verisimilitude of digital imaging, combined with its spatial versatility, its novel forms of animation etc mean that these images invite speculations from both scientists and public viewers about the value and capacities of life, exactly because they allow vivacity to be modeled in new ways. As Brad says, his images allowed new types of biological questions to be asked and researched, while also provoking public viewers to ask what this new biology means for them. Both types of question are essentially fantasies, but as I’ve argued in a few publications (esp the Visible Human Project: informatic bodies and posthuman medicine book) biomedicine and the life sciences have rich imaginative practices and need fantasy sites (e.g. The VHP, the embryo images) where researchers can have access to an imaginative resource, especially a public one that a field can hold in common.

Catherine--A/Prof. Catherine Waldby
International Research FellowSociology & Social Policy
University of Sydney Australia

to comment on this post, click on "comments" below
to return to main page go to www.visualcultureandbioscience.org