Courses

A comprehensive introduction to the field of Biological Art. This course focuses upon recent advances in the life sciences, both in theory and practice. Emphasis is placed on developing critical and creative thought, discussion of ethical and cultural issues, and cross-disciplinary experimentation in art and science. The course includes lecture, studio and laboratory components.

This course charts the intertwined histories and mutual influence of the visual arts and the life sciences in the Western world. The premise of this course is that each discipline has provoked the other and made important contributions to the study and nature of Life, but that each and their perceived differences are products of an underlying worldview as evidenced by artifacts and scholarship of the time. The course includes lecture, studio and laboratory components.

Students will explore the principal debates within the environmental humanities involving our relationship with non-human organisms, both external (conservation, global warming) and internal (our microbiome), and our relationship to our own biology (genomics, biotechnology). Through a series of field trips and readings highlighting these debates, students will connect them to practical applications in the field, the laboratory or in literary and filmic texts.