[rohrpost] Symposium about art and ethics: From Bioethics to Bioart: The Question About the Limits, XII. World Congress of Bioethics, Mexico City, June 25-28, 2014

[Ingeborg Reichle]

XII. World Congress of Bioethics

“Bioethics in a Globalized World: Science, Society and the
Individual,“ organized by the International Association of Bioethics
(IAB), hosted by The National Bioethics Commission of Mexico, Mexico
City, June 25–28, 2014.

The full program of the XII. World Congress of Bioethics will consist
of 26 invited lectures, 50 symposium presentations, 280 oral
presentations, and 66 poster presentations.

Symposium: From Bioethics to Bioart: The Question About the Limits
(Panels I and II)

Chair: Prof. Dr. María Antonia González Valerio (National Autonomous
University of Mexico, Mexico City, Mexico) and PD Dr. Ingeborg Reichle
(Humboldt University, Berlin, Germany).

Date and Time:

Thursday 26, June 2014, 12.15–13.45 (Panel I) Room 8, 18.30–20.00
(Panel II) Room 7, Venue: Hotel Hilton Reforma, Av. Juarez #70,
Colonia Centro, Mexico City, Distrito Federal, 06010, Mexico.

Concept:

>From a philosophical point of view a limit is that which enables
something to exist, for an entity can only exist — and develop and
evolve — within certain boundaries. The limits, then, are an
ontological matter that allows us to think in terms of shapes and
figures, morphologies, transformations, and even names. Life is
something that comes into being only in the presence of certain limits
or constraints, regardless of their plasticity and ever changing
capacity. The fragility and the power of life lie within these limits,
boundaries, and frontiers. However, it is not only a question of
biological limits: For example, within which framework is life
biologically possible? It is also a question about conceptual limits,
models of knowing, epistemological boundaries, and so on. Life is also
a concept, a concept that has changed dramatically due to the arrival
of biotechnology within the frame of technoscience. To reflect on
these limits, from biology to philosophy and art (such as bioart),
seeks first and foremost to propose arguments about what life is
within the flexibility of the limits that we are experiencing nowadays
in the realm of technoscience. In these terms, not only science but
also art has an important role, because historically the latter has
been a human activity that constantly configures and refigures the
limits of the sensible world. In these two panels we intend to
organize a debate from the viewpoint of various disciplines about life
and its limits in the crossovers between bio arts, ethics, sciences,
and philosophies.


Speakers:

•	Brandon Ballangée (New York, United States)
•	Deborah Dorotinsky (Mexico City, Mexico)
•	María Antonia González Valerio (Mexico City, Mexico)
•	Nicole C. Karafyllis (Braunschweig, Germany)
•	Sebastián Lomelí (Mexico City, Mexico)
•	Rosaura Martínez (Mexico City, Mexico)
•	Ingeborg Reichle (Berlin, Germany)



Program:

(Panel I), Room 8

Thursday 26, June 2014, 12.15–13.45

(12.15–12.20) Introduction, María Antonia González Valerio (National
Autonomous University of Mexico, Mexico City, Mexico) and Ingeborg
Reichle (Humboldt University, Berlin, Germany)

(12.20–12.40) Portraiture, Limits, Returns, Deborah Dorotinsky
(National Autonomous University of Mexico, Mexico City, Mexico)

(12.40–13.00) The Art, Science, and Ecological Ethics of Deformed
Amphibians: A Practitioner‘s Perspective, Brandon Ballengée (School of
Visual Arts, New York, NY, USA and McGill University, Montréal, QC,
Canada)

(13.00–13.20) Debating Non-normative Approaches in BioArt Practices
against the Prospect of a Bioscience-based Economy, Ingeborg Reichle
(Humboldt University, Berlin, Germany)

(13.20–13.40) Liminal Portraits: The Embodiment of Other Ways of
Living, Sebastián Lomelí (National Autonomous University of Mexico,
Mexico City, Mexico)

(13.40–13.45) Closing Remarks

(panel II), Room 7

Thursday 26, June 2014, 18.30–20.00

(18.30–18.35) Introduction, María Antonia González Valerio (National
Autonomous University of Mexico, Mexico City, Mexico) and Ingeborg
Reichle (Humboldt University, Berlin, Germany)

(18.35–19.00) The Freudian Psychic Apparatus: A Lifedeath Bioartifact,
Rosaura Martínez (National Autonomous University of Mexico, Mexico
City, Mexico)

(19.00–19.25) Bioethics or Ethics of Biotechnology? Reflecting the
Limits of Evaluating Biofacts from an Ethics Perspective, Nicole C.
Karafyllis (TU Braunschweig, Braunschweig, Germany)

(19.25–19.50) Teleology, Functionality, and Instrumentality in
Biology: An Approach from the Artifacts and Aesthetic Ontology, María
Antonia González Valerio (National Autonomous University of Mexico,
Mexico City, Mexico)

(19.50–20.00) Closing Remarks


Abstracts:

The Art, Science, and Ecological Ethics of Deformed Amphibians: A
Practitioner‘s Perspective, Brandon Ballengée (School of Visual Arts,
New York, NY, USA and McGill University, Montréal, QC, Canada)

Hind limb deformities (sometimes called “malformations”) in natural
populations of amphibians have been an important environmental issue
for several decades. The most commonly reported abnormalities in North
America, Europe, and Australia are those featuring missing, partial,
or truncated hind limbs, yet specific causes for this phenomenon have
remained unclear. Only recently have aquatic predators such as
dragonfly nymphs (Odonata) and some fishes have been linked to tadpole
injuries resulting in these types of limb abnormalities. Here I
present evidence from both field and laboratory studies demonstrating
that selective predation by Odonate nymphs may play a significant role
in inducing limb deformities in natural populations of anuran
amphibians. Transdisciplinary art and participatory science programs
were utilized during these studies to engage public volunteers
(citizen scientists). Participants achieved increased awareness of
amphibian conservation issues through direct participation in primary
scientific studies. Art inspired from these research experiences has
been exhibited internationally with the intention of furthering a
message of amphibian conservation. An ecological ethical framework
(derived from the ideas of John Muir, Aldo Leopold, Rachel Carson,
Richard Louv, and others) underlies these combined art, science, and
environmental practices, which will be discussed.

CV: Brandon Ballengée is an artist, biologist, and conservationist; he
creates transdisciplinary artworks inspired from his ecological field
and laboratory research. Ballengée’s art has been exhibited
internationally, and in the summer of 2013 the first career survey of
his work debuted at the Château de Charamarande in Essonne (France),
and recently travelled to the Museum Het Domein in Sittard
(Netherlands) in 2014. Recent solo exhibitions have been the Alden B.
Dowe Museum of Art and Science (Midland; USA: 2014); Schuylkill Center
for Environmental Education (Philadelphia, USA: 2013), Ronald Feldman
Fine Arts (New York City, USA: 2012); Longue Vue House and Gardens
(New Orleans, USA; 2011); PAV, Centro d'Arte Contemporanea (Turin,
Italy: 2010); Nowhere Gallery (Milan, Italy: 2009); Yorkshire
Sculpture Park (Wakefield, England: 2008); Central Park’s Arsenal
Gallery (New York City, USA: 2007); Peabody Museum of Natural History
(Yale University, New Haven, USA: 2007); and others. His works have
been included in several international biennials and festivals
including: Documenta 13 (Germany: 2012); Prospect 2 New Orleans (USA:
2011); Transmediale 11 (Germany: 2010); 3rd Moscow Biennale (Russia:
2009); Biennale for Electronic Arts Perth (Australia: 2007); Venice
Biennale (Italy: 2005); Geumgang Nature Art Biennale (South Korea:
2004); and others. In 2011 he was awarded a conservation leadership
fellowship from the National Audubon Society’s TogetherGreen Program
(USA). He is currently a professor at the School of Visual Art in New
York, NY, and a Visiting Scientist at McGill University in Montréal,
Quebec.



Portraiture, Limits, Returns, Deborah Dorotinsky (Instituto de
Investigaciones Estéticas, National Autonomous University of Mexico,
Mexico City, Mexico)

Historically, one of portraiture’s central tasks has been the
representation of the alleged identity of the model. Within
nineteenth-century anthropological practices, and even more so after
the invention of photography (1839), the anthropometric and
ethnographic portrait not only became “research data” but also served
to establish the moral, social, and biological worth of ethnic
populations. Identification photography thus served a purpose in both
defining types of subjects, and literally subjecting populations to
different power/knowledge regimes.  The case study I will approach
here is a photographic series, Genetic self-portrait created by South
African artist Gary Schneider between 1997 and 1998. In this series,
Schneider presents us with close-ups of his body made with different
visualization techniques used in laboratories, but printed using
antique photographic techniques. It would seem that the artist
abandons the tradition of portraiture as conceived in art historical
terms by presenting us with microscopic parts of his own body: a
sperm, a hair follicle, a mitochondrion, intestinal flora – all of
them printed in large format and installed in New York’s Center for
Creative Photography. This paper will explore how portraiture and
self-portraits operate as devices that explore the limits of
representation of subjects by making use of historical photographic
techniques. I am particularly interested in pinpointing boundaries in
self-portraiture figuration processes as well as the return to or
revival of historic or antique photographic techniques as strategies
for making scientific images “artistic” while at the same time
contesting the ethical scope of identification images. Since the
nineteenth century, identification photographs have played an
instrumental role in law enforcement, medicine, and schooling. They
served to establish identifiable images of normality and deviation,
health and illness, civility, and barbarity. They were part of eugenic
approaches and biotypologies. In using historical processes to print
laboratory images, does Schneider evade the negative ethical
connotations ascribed to identification photographs? Does he make
these issues more salient and thus puts forward a critique of these
images, which according to John Tagg bear “the burden of
representation”? How do these historic photographic printing
techniques present us with a paradox? What are the new premises that
images like Schneider’s allow us to imagine for the problematic
representation of human diversity? These are some of the questions
this paper will attempt to address.

CV: Deborah Dorotinsky is an anthropologist, who turned to art
history. She is chair of the Graduate Art History program at the
National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) since 2011, and full
time researcher at Instituto de Investigaciones Estéticas in UNAM
since 2004. She holds an MA and PhD in art history from UNAM and a BA
in cultural anthropology from UC Berkeley. Her research centers on
issues involving racism and gender constructions. She has dealt with
the photographic representation of indigenous peoples of Mexico and
the construction of gender in Mexican visual culture between 1900 and
1940. She has published extensively on the history of Mexican
Photography in the journals Luna Córnea and Alquimia. Her book, Viaje
de sombras. Fotografías del Desierto de la Soledad y los indios
lacandones en los años cuarenta, 2013, (Voyage of shadows. Photographs
of the Desierto de la Soledad and the Lacandon Indians in the 1940s)
traces the visual and conceptual genealogy of the photographic
representation of both the Lacandon rainforest and its inhabitants,
the Lacandon Indians, as seen since the nineteenth century to the
1940s to unravel how this natural area and its inhabitants were
construed as the zero degree of civilization in Mexican territories.
She is a member of the Arte+Ciencia research group and has
participated in the art collective BIOS Ex machinA and its first
bioart exhibition. Sin origen/Sin semilla in 2012. She is a partner in
the Getty Foundation project, ”Unfolding Art Histories in Latin
America, the long 19th century,” a joint venture with Universidad
Estadoal do Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Universidad Nacional San Martín in
Argentina, and UNAM in Mexico.



Teleology, Functionality, and Instrumentality in Biology: An Approach
from the Artifacts and Aesthetic Ontology , María Antonia González
Valerio (Faculty of Philosophy and Literature, National Autonomous
University of Mexico, Mexico City, Mexico)

Epistemological models in contemporary biology tend to criticize
teleological explanations, since, in general, it is understood that
teleology belongs to a worldview where the cosmos has a purpose.
Taking the physics paradigms as granted, where explanations through
necessary and sufficient conditions are the basis, biology discusses
the pertinence of functionality as a non-teleological explanation
model – or at least allegedly. It is said, then, that functionality is
different from teleology, and therefore many explanations in biology
are built through functions and functionality, from genetics to
ecology. Nevertheless, it is necessary to at least distinguish between
functionality in ontological terms, and in operational terms. If it is
understood in ontological terms, and then functionality is used to
explain the existence of something, the idea of purpose usually
appears. Teleology and ontological functionality have to deal with the
idea of purpose, whether it is an immanent or transcendent one. My
contention here is that rethinking teleology, functionality, and
instrumentality from the artifacts, especially the artwork, provides
us with different arguments to understand the idea of purpose and
functionality. Purpose can be thought of without the notion of an
ending and without chronological organizations; it can be understood
from the perspective of limits, posited as that ontological condition
from whence something comes to be. Art is a producer of these limits.
But life is also a producer. Art and life can only exist within these
limits, which are flexible and in a state of constant change. These
limits are also purposiveness, and within them life and dead come to
be. If functionality is an important model to understand biological
processes, it is also because death, non-being, ceasing to be, are
determinants of life. If physics can operate with epistemological
models where functionality and purposiveness are out of the frame, it
is because its limits do not include death and conclusion of a life term.

CV: María Antonia González Valerio is a philosopher working in the
fields of aesthetics and ontology, with a focus on biotechnologies and
the arts. She is full professor at the Faculty of Philosophy, National
Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM). She is the author of two
books: Un tratado de ficción. Ontología de la mimesis (Herder, 2010)
and El arte develado (Herder, 2005). She is co-editor of five books,
the most recent is: Pròs Bíon: Reflexiones naturales desde el arte, la
ciencia y la filosofía (UNAM, 2013). She is the head of the
interdisciplinary research group Art+Science, based at the UNAM, and
the coordinator of the arts collective BIOS Ex machinA (workshop for
the fabrication of the human and the non-human). In 2012 she curated
the bioart exhibition Sin origen/Sin semilla (Without origin/Seedless)
at the Museo Universitario de Ciencias y Artes (MUCA) Campus Roma and
Museo Universitario Arte Contemporáneo (MUAC).



Bioethics or Ethics of Biotechnology? Reflecting the Limits of
Evaluating Biofacts from an Ethics Perspective, Nicole C. Karafyllis
(TU Braunschweig, Braunschweig, Germany)

The presentation will emphasize the normative clashes arising at the
intersection of application of two forms of applied ethics: (a)
bioethics, and (b) ethics of technology. As will be outlined, both
evaluative forms and areas of applied ethics rely on different
normative fundaments with regard to entities and modes of praxis. As a
consequence, many products of transgenic Bioart remain in a
no-man’s-land of moral judgment. Whereas the demand for an “ethics of
art” has already been announced by ethicists, I will argue for an
“ethics of biotechnology,” helping to overcome the limits of the
above-mentioned forms of applied ethics (a) and (b). The classic
realms of artifacts are technology and the arts, challenged in recent
decades by the idea of biofacts: living artifacts. When we look at
biotechnologically made entities, we are not inspired to ask “What are
they?” but rather “What are they good for?” Artifacts in technology
have to function according to a specific purpose. “Function” and
“purpose” are seen differently in the arts, which, per a common
definition, do not serve utility. There, the mediality of the artifact
shows when the artefact irritates. This special form of drama that the
arts have a right to establish will be challenged by classical
bioethical approaches. Therefore, we might look at the alternative
approach of ethics of technology, as both technology and the arts aim
to embody emancipative potential and deal with irritations.

CV: Nicole N. Karafyllis is a trained philosopher and biologist, and
since 2010 chair of the Department of Philosophy at the Technische
Universität Braunschweig (Germany). 2008–2010 she held a full
professorship in philosophy at the United Arab Emirates University in
Abu Dhabi (UAE), followed by a visiting professorship in Cultural
Philosophy of Science 2007 at the University of Vienna (Austria). Her
habilitation thesis in 2006 dealt with the phenomenology of growth.
Karafyllis’s main areas of research are: philosophy of science and
technology, biotechnologies and the arts, philosophy of culture and
intercultural exchange. Selected publications: N.C. Karafyllis:
Biologisch, Natürlich, Nachhaltig. Philosophische Aspekte des
Naturzugangs im 21. Jahrhundert. Tübingen: Francke 2001 (in German).
N.C. Karafyllis and G. Ulshöfer (eds.): Sexualized Brains. Scientific
Modeling of Emotional Intelligence from a Cultural Perspective.
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press 2008; Putzen als Passion. Berlin: Kadmos 2013.



Liminal Portraits: The Embodiment of Other Ways of Living
Sebastián Lomelí (National Autonomous University of Mexico, Mexico
City, Mexico)

Through the concept of “liminal portraits” I analyze the political and
existential possibilities of the work of two artists: Félix
González-Torres and Marta de Menezes. Their artworks ask the
spectators to recognize themselves in images, which are hardly related
to them at all, but in so doing they are questioned in two specific
directions. First, the pieces ask about the limits of personal
identity and factical existence. Second, the embodiment of those
images as (own) possible portraits reveals political programs
concerning the definition of the body, health, and death.

CV:
Sebastián Lomelí Bravo is a member of the research group Arte+Ciencia
and of the art collective BIOS Ex machinA. He is currently a PhD
student at the UNAM (Mexico), and his doctoral work explores the idea
of production in contemporary and high-tech art practices. His general
research interests are ontology and aesthetics. He has coordinated two
volumes on the philosophy of Maria Zambrano.



The Freudian Psychic Apparatus: A Lifedeath Bioartifact, Rosaura
Martínez (School of Philosophy, National Autonomous University of
Mexico, Mexico City, Mexico)

The Freudian psychic apparatus is a bioartifact, that is, a machine
that mediates between life as tension and death as the complete
discharge of it. This apparatus sets life in motion in a hyperbolic
fashion, but as a detour towards death. For Freud, life in historical
and evolutionary terms is a burden that has to be lived off. The
paradoxical and speculative relation between Eros and Thanatos is seen
as the origin of the psyche as a complex mechanism of negotiation
between life and death. Thus, the psyche as an apparatus is designed
in order to discharge tension (life), but at the same time it also
obeys another tendency, which Freud calls the constancy principle.
This principle creates a reserve of energy in the form of memory that
resists a shortcut, an immediate or suicidal death. Memory is that
which saves a deferred discharge and the way through which upcoming
tensions discharge. This sort of archive constitutes the protection
against death. In this sense, the death drive is, on one hand, that
which enlivens the need to create a reserve and, on the other and at
the same time, that which is directed at destroying any archive. This
means that the channels for tension release can be erotic and life
affirmative. The Freudian psychic apparatus turns out to be a
lifedeath apparatus or an apparatus of the “good livingdying.”

CV: Rosaura Martínez is a trained philosopher with a focus on Freudian
psychoanalysis. She is full time associate professor of philosophy at
the School of Philosophy, National Autonomous University of Mexico
(UNAM) and head of the research project “Philosophers after Freud”
(UNAM, 2013–2016) as well as research collaborator of the project
“Manipulation of living organisms. Art limits in the intertwining of
sciences and technologies” (UNAM, 2011–2014). In 2012 she was a member
of the artist collective BIOS Ex machinA Art exhibition Sin origen/Sin
semilla at the MUCA ROMA museum, November 2012. She received her PhD
in philosophy from UNAM with the dissertation Freudian Psychoanalysis:
A Reading from Derrida’s Notion of Writing and an MA in philosophy
from The New School University in New York City with the dissertation:
The Fragmented Subject of Psychoanalysis, supervised by Richard
Bernstein. Selected publications: R. Martínez: Freud y Derrida:
escritura y psique (Freud and Derrida: Writing and Psyche), SIGLO XXI,
2013. “The Alterability of the Memory Trace”. The Psychoanalytic
Review (The Official Journal of the National Psychological Association
for Psychoanalysis), vol. 98, no. 4. August, 2011, pp. 531–555. “Freud
y Derrida: Escritura en el aparato psíquico”. Diánoia. Revista del
Instituto de Investigaciones Filosóficas, UNAM y FCE, vol. 58, no. 68.
May, 2012, pp. 65–79.



Debating Non-normative Approaches in BioArt Practices against the
Prospect of a Bioscience-based Economy, Ingeborg Reichle
(Humboldt-University, Berlin, Germany)

In the last twenty years the incorporation of biological material,
like cells, bacteria, tissue cultures, and scientific technologies,
into the arts went hand in hand with debates about the aesthetic value
and ethical and ontological consequences of introducing cutting edge
science into the arts. With the emergence of BioArt, biotechnology
became part of the art world, raising questions about the aesthetic
and ethical status of manipulating living organisms in the age of
technoscience. The adoption of bioscience techniques and living
materials by the arts has opened up new avenues of artistic
expression, and by bringing genetic engineering closer to the public
through art has provoked wider reflection about the ethics of turning
biology into technology. In recent years many bioartists have
challenged traditional ethics through the non-normative approaches
exhibited in their art, and this has thrown open the issues involved
for public debate. In my presentation I shall address the issue of
whether we need to formulate normative ethical guidelines for BioArt,
because BioArt appears to be gaining a voice within the public debate
about the transformation of our current economy into a
bioscience-based economy — a development which will affect many
aspects of our lives in a major way.

CV: Ingeborg Reichle is an art historian and cultural theorist writing
on contemporary art, new technologies, and new media, with a focus on
biotechnology and artificial life. 2005–2011 she held a research
position at the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities
in Berlin. In 2004 she received her Ph.D. from the Humboldt University
Berlin with her dissertation Art in the Age of Technoscience: Genetic
Engineering, Robotics, and Artificial Life in Contemporary Art,
published 2005 in German and 2009 in English, both with Springer
publishers,Vienna/New York. She completed her habilitation thesis in
2013 titled Bilderwissen – Wissensbilder. Zur Gegenwart der
Epistemologie der Bilder at the Humboldt University Berlin. In 2010
she curated the bioart exhibition Jenseits des Menschen – Beyond
Humans at the Berlin Medical History Museum of the Charité Hospital.
Since 2000 she has been a guest lecturer at various international
institutions including the School of Visual Arts, New York; the
Department of Biology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT),
Boston; the Life-Science Lab, German Cancer Research Center,
Heidelberg; Timbusu College National University of Singapore;
SymbioticA at the School of Anatomy, Physiology and Human Biology,
University of Western Australia; School of Creative Media, City
University of Hong Kong; Lomonosov Moscow State University.