GREEN LIGHT

1. Auflage 2012
ISBN: 978-0-262-51730-0
Verlag: MIT PR

Buch, Englisch, 264 Seiten, Format (B × H): 178 mm x 229 mm, Gewicht: 413 g

Reihe: Leonardo Book Series

Humans have bred plants and animals with an eye to aesthetics for centuries: flowers are selected for colorful blossoms or luxuriant foliage; racehorses are prized for the elegance of their frames. Hybridized plants were first exhibited as fine art in 1936, when the Museum of Modern Art in New York showed Edward Steichen’s hybrid delphiniums. Since then, bio art has become a genre; artists work with a variety of living things, including plants, animals, bacteria, slime molds, and fungi. Many commentators have addressed the social and political concerns raised by making art out of living material. In Green Light, however, George Gessert examines the role that aesthetic perception has played in bio art and other interventions in evolution. Gessert looks at a variety of life forms that humans have helped shape, focusing on plants--the most widely domesticated form of life and the one that has been crucial to his own work as an artist. We learn about pleasure gardens of the Aztecs, cultivated for intoxicating fragrance; the aesthetic standards promoted by national plant societies; a daffodil that looks like a rose; and praise for weeds and wildflowers.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Gessert, George

Fachgebiete

• Naturwissenschaften Biowissenschaften Biowissenschaften Evolutionsbiologie
• Geisteswissenschaften Kunst Kunst, allgemein Kunstpsychologie und -soziologie
• Geisteswissenschaften Kunst Künstlerische Stoffe, Motive, Themen Künstlerische Stoffe, Motive, Themen: Natur & Tiere (Stillleben, Landschaften etc.)
• Geisteswissenschaften Kunst Kunst, allgemein Kunsttheorie, Kunstphilosophie
• Geisteswissenschaften Kunst Kunstgeschichte

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Series Foreword Acknowledgments Publication History xv Introduction 1 Divine Plants and Magical Animals 2 Aesthetic Effects of Domestication 11 3 The Rainforests of Domestication 21 4 The Rise of Ornamental Plants 33 5 Darwin's Sublime 41 6 Playing God 47 7 Standards of Excellence 53 8 Doubles 61 9 Kitsch Plants 81 10 Bastard Flowers, Genetic Goofies, and Freud's Bow Wows 93 11 Biotechnology in the Garden 107 12 Recent Art Involving DNA 111 13 Naming Life 125 14 Anthropocentrism and Genetic Art 133 15 The Angel of Extinction 143 16 Seven Breeding Complexes 153 17 The Slowest Art 171 18 Breeding for Wildness 177 Appendix 1: Organisms in Bio Art 185 Appendix 2: Bio Art Terminology 191 Appendix 3: The Four Main Types of Double Flowers 193 Appendix 4: Books and Catalogs on Biotech Art Published since 2000 195 Notes 197 Index

Über Autor(innen)

Gessert, George
George Gessert is an artist whose work focuses on the overlap between art and genetics. His exhibits often involve plants he has hybridized or documentation of breeding projects. His writings have appeared in Leonardo, Art Papers, Design Issues, Massachusetts Review, Hortus, Best American Essays 2007, Pushcart Prize XXX, and other publications.

George Gessert is an artist whose work focuses on the overlap between art and genetics. His exhibits often involve plants he has hybridized or documentation of breeding projects. His writings have appeared in Leonardo, Art Papers, Design Issues, Massachusetts Review, Hortus, Best American Essays 2007, Pushcart Prize XXX, and other publications.