Inspired by her BioArt Residency at the biotechnology company Integral Molecular, Mina Zarfsaz presents a menagerie of experiments exploring the speculative nature of sensory data in the sciences.
Through her continued research she explores the phenomena of translation, interpretation, and the illusion of truth. Science is no longer the subject, but becomes a point of departure and a catalyst for improvisation: data jazz. GAG ACT is a sequel to the first phase of the project, Shadowplay, that was released as an interactive online experience to imagine a sociology of microbiomes. Both phases appropriate scientific and sociocultural metaphors to show parallels in behavior, to contemplate on the nature of evolution that frame biases, power dynamics, forms of intelligence, and ethical ways of being and becoming at macro and micro levels.
Currently in view at Esther Klein Gallery October 14th-November 27th 2021
THIS PROJECT WAS MADE POSSIBLE WITH GENEROUS FUNDING FROM THE DOLFINGER-MCMAHON FOUNDATION.
Mina Zarfsaz, More Than Human, 2023
This book-object is aiming to further synthesize the research outcomes of a BioArt residency project at the biotech company, Integral Molecular, and hosted by the University City Science Center in Philadelphia. Frameworks such as play, and discovery elicit treasure seeking impulses in this collection that also presents three other views by women artists in the Philadelphia area that have similar inquiries in their research and aim at unpacking humanity in the digital age and the cultural connotations of human, machine, and multi-species—live, synthetic, animate or inanimate— interactions. To read this publication, one must use the grid layout of the specimen box as a guide to align the pages (single and not bound) according to the numerical characters of each cell. The goal was not to create a traditional book and allow the speculative, and interactive nature of the experimentations to reemerge in archiving and contextualizing the continued research. Embracing this novel form of content and form relationship for this book originates from the scientific method of archiving bits as collections.
This book was made possible by the support of a grant by the Leeway Foundation.