Koen Vanmechelen
Koen Vanmechelen (born August 26, 1965 in Sint-Truiden) is a Belgian artist who began his career in the early 1990s. Central to his work is the concept of bio-cultural diversity, which he investigates through the domestic chicken and its ancestral species, the red junglefowl or "Gallus gallus". Vanmechelen began with his Cosmopolitan Chicken Project (CCP), an international undertaking of crossbreeding national chicken species, in search of a Cosmopolitan Chicken. His 20th generation, the Mechelse Wyandotte, was born in September 2016 in Detroit. Vanmechelen has several projects parallel to the CCP: The CosmoGolem, The Walking Egg, MOUTH , COMBAT and The Cosmopolitan Chicken Research Project (CC®P), all of which he manages from his Open University of Diversity, located in the old Gelatin Factory near Hasselt Harbour. The artist's work is an investigation of and an ode to the beautiful diversity and hybridity of life: Biocultural diversity and the consequent interaction between art and science form the core theme of his oeuvre. Vanmechelen often collaborates with scientists and experts from different disciplines, such as Jean-Jacques Cassiman, Rik Pinxten and Marleen Temmerman. He uses innovative technologies such as 3D-scanning, morphometrics, 3D-printing and interactive 3D  visualisation. His works are inherently cross-medial and interdisciplinary. Vanmechelen creates, amongst others, expressive paintings and drawings, photography, video, installation art and wooden sculptures. The common visual theme throughout these various methods of expression are the chicken and the egg. These have, over the years, become important symbols to Vanmechelen, allowing the artist to interconnect scientific, philosophical, and ethical issues, and to frame the subject of debates and lectures. A new species of flat worm discovered in Venice (It) during the artist solo exhibition Nato a Venezia at the biennial of Venice was in 2013 named Trigonostomum Vanmecheleni in honour  of the artist. Biography. Koen Vanmechelen, who lives in the Belgian town of Meeuwen-Gruitrode, is professionally based in Hasselt. He is a self-taught artist who studied hotel management in Antwerp and worked several years as a cook and pastry chef in Belgian top restaurants. His father is an artist, his mother a fashion designer. Vanmechelen's interest in chickens and birds started at an early age, due to the trips he made with his uncle Louis Gonnissen, a Belgian ornithologist and television personality. At the age of five, he says in an interview, he already had a breeding  coop in his bedroom. Conservators Jan Kenis, Jan Hoet and illustrator Gregie de Maeyer launched him into the world of art in the early nineties. His first works consisted mainly of wooden constructions, assemblages and cages for birds. This aligns him with the Belgian tradition of assemblage artists. In the nineties, Vanmechelen quickly evolved into a conceptual artist and later on a multi-, trans- en interdisciplinary artist. During the late nineties, Vanmechelen launched his Cosmopolitan Chicken Project (CCP), which occupies a unique place in art history. It gave him fast national and international recognition in and outside the art world . Foundations. Cosmopolitan Chicken Project. The Cosmopolitan Chicken Project (CCP) is an ongoing trans-disciplinary art project started in the late 1990s which aims to create a hybrid of all races of chicken in the world. At the moment it has reached its eighteenth generation, a crossbreeding between the Mechelse Styrian (the offspring of the sixteenth generation) and the Austrian Sulmtaler. The CCP is a commentary about diversity, complexity and immunity. The breeding of a perfectly “cosmopolitan” chicken, carrying the genetic material of all possible races, is a metaphor for multicultural human society. According to Vanmechelen, humanity will only be able  to thrive and stay “healthy” in a situation of maximized diversity, a notion reflected by the results of the repeated crossbreeding of races which had previously only been inbred: the offspring of the CCP have longer lifespans and higher fertility rates than the average domesticated chicken, as well as a more effective immune system, making them less liable to be stricken by disease. This intercultural approach has resulted in a chicken carrying traces of DNA from chicken races all over the world: Belgium, France, the U.S., Britain, the Netherlands, Germany, Mexico, Thailand, Brazil, Turkey, Russia, Egypt, Cuba, Italy, Senegal, China , Slovenia and Austria. The CCP has also spawned a plethora of drawings, paintings, sculptures and installations. Cosmopolitan Chicken Research Project. The Cosmopolitan Chicken Research Project (CC®P) is the more scientifically oriented half of the CCP. In collaboration with esteemed Belgian human geneticist Jean-Jacques Cassiman, Vanmechelen researches the genetic make-up of the chicken races participating in the CCP. The database generated by this research has been said to be the most extensive one in Belgium. The results of the research have been presented in the form of virtual representations as well as 3D-printed sculptures. The piece  Evolution of a Hybrid represents three chicken chromosomes, two isolated from inbred, domesticated chickens, the third from a crossbreed: “Chromosomes are laid out in circles, connecting at one tip of the chromosome and wrapped in spherical shapes. The longest chromosomes (chromosomes 1 and 2) cross at the top of the sphere. The number of homozygous and heterozygous polymorphisms along the chromosomes are indicated by peaks pointing inwards and outwards, respectively. As a result, inbred chickens have relatively more peaks pointing inwards while crossbred chickens have more peaks pointing outwards.” COMBAT/CMRM. COMBAT was a project commemorating the one hundredth anniversary  of the start of the First World War. It was an offshoot of parent project Coming World Remember Me (CWRM), a collaboration between Vanmechelen and Jan Moeyaert. The ultimate goal of CWRM was to produce 600,000 small clay statues, one for every soldier killed on Belgian soil during WW1, by the end of 2018, the 100th anniversary of the end of the First World War. The statues were made by the public, aided by international workshops. At the end of the project, they were all part of a land art installation near the Palingbeek in Ypres, former no man’s  land. The temporary installation was finalized in April 2018 and covered a surface of several hectares. Wooden Coin is a project in collaboration with bpost, in support of SOS Children’s Villages. It consists of oak tree planted in the center of a roundabout near the future location of the OpUnDi headquarters in Genk. Five twigs, each originating from a different species of oak and representing the five world continents, are grafted onto the tree. The roots have been adorned with pieces of 1 eurocent. Current projects. The project was accompanied by a complementary charitative initiative, encouraging people to donate  1 euro to SOS Children’s Villages. All contributors received a certificate of donation signed by Vanmechelen. Arena de evolución is a Cuban-based project featuring four “arenas”, places of learning and research regarding themes such as biological and cultural immunity, diversity, fertility and ethics. Each arena is co-chaired by Vanmechelen himself and an expert in the field concerned. The findings generated by the research conducted in the arenas will be collected in the LOCK (Library Of Collected Knowledge) and presented at the Havana Biennial. The project was kicked off with a symposium at the Open University of Diversity  in Hasselt during which the core themes of the project were presented to the public by the scientific authorities involved. In September of this year, an international and interdisciplinary team of thinkers traveled to Arusha, Tanzania to set up the second arena and to be immersed in the culture of the native Maasai. The views and opinions of the Maasai regarding nature, evolution, and the increasing influence of modernity on the natural world and environment form an integral part of the project. Expositions. Solo-exhibitions (selection) Group exhibitions (selection)