Circulating Flesh | Stelarc | Virtual Futures 2011
Channel: Virtual Futures
Date: 01/02/2012

Stelarc - Circulating Flesh: The Cadaver, the Comatose and the Chimera

Virtual Futures
University of Warwick, 18-19 June 2011
http://VirtualFutures.co.uk

Stelarc is a performance artist who is interested in the post-evolutionary architecture of the body. He has visually probed and acoustically amplified his body. In 1975-1976 He made three films of the inside of his body, 3 metres of probes into his lungs, stomach and colon. Between 1976-1988 he completed 25 body suspension performances with hooks into the skin, in different positions and varying situations and locations. He has used medical instruments, prosthetics, robotics, Virtual Reality systems, the Internet and biotechnology to explore alternate, intimate and involuntary interfaces with the body. He has performed with a THIRD HAND (1980-1997), a VIRTUAL ARM (1991-1992), a STOMACH SCULPTURE (1993) and EXOSKELETON (1997-2006), a 6-legged walking robot. His FRACTAL FLESH (1995), PING BODY (1996) and PARASITE (1997) performances explored involuntary, remote and Internet choreography of the body with electrical stimulation of the muscles. His PROSTHETIC HEAD (2003- 2011) is an embodied conversational agent that speaks to the person who interrogates it. The Prosthetic Head has become a research platform for the Thinking Head project. The recent robotic embodiment, the ARTICULATED HEAD (2010-2011) was a finalist in the Australian Engineering Excellence Awards, 2010. He is surgically constructing an EAR ON ARM (2006-2011) that will be Internet enabled, making it a publicly accessible acoustical organ for people in other places. He is presently performing with his avatar clones from his SECOND LIFE site. In 1997 he was appointed Honorary Professor of Art and Robotics at Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh. He has completed Visiting Artist positions in Art and Technology, at the Faculty of Art and Design at Ohio State University in Columbus in 2002, 2003 & 2004. He has been Principal Research Fellow in the Performance Arts Digital Research Unit and a Visiting Professor at The Nottingham Trent University, UK (2000-2003). In 2003 he was awarded an Honorary Degree of Laws by Monash University. In 2004 was awarded a two year New Media Arts Fellowship. He has also received an Australia Council New Projects grant in 2010 to develop a micro-robot. In 2010 he was awarded the Prix Ars Electronica Hybrid Arts Prize. He is currently Chair in Performance Art, School of Arts, Brunel University, Uxbridge, UK. He is also Senior Research Fellow and Visiting Artist at the MARCS Auditory Labs at the University of Western Sydney, Australia. Stelarc's artwork is represented by the SCOTT LIVESEY GALLERIES in Melbourne.