Infinite Transformations in a Suitcase: A Bioart Homage to Cultural Resilience

Abstract

Understanding and engaging with cultural practices that respond to change and resist oppression are increasingly relevant to critical design in and beyond HCI. While these areas of exploration are no stranger to the practices of bioart and biodesign that draw on the cultural, aesthetic, and practical affordances of living organisms to engage audiences and users in reflection and cultural production, they are less familiar in HCI and computing. In recent years, increased access to low-cost synthetic biology tools and techniques has made it easier for non-experts, including those trained in computing but not biology, to experiment with modifying living organisms for creative and artistic purposes, including at the molecular DNA level. Infinite Transformations in a Suitcase is a multimedia installation that uses bioart, visual art, and music strategies to create a meditative space inviting reflection on the resilience of culture. At its center is a glass of poetry-infused wine created using genetically modified yeast cells whose DNA contains an encoded 14th-century Sufi poem by Hafiz of Shiraz, surrounded by video of it being written in Farsi calligraphy. By combining multiple embodied and abstract poetic elements, the installation invites the audience to reflect on the materiality and movement of culture.