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<DNA versus HTML>
coding and de-coding in art.

by Genco Gulan

To code or not to code, that is the problem." Seeing is easy when you do not need to type the code. Being is simple if you do not know how to be. At the moment you begin to de-(be) yourself, you will see (the) code inside.

So what's next? What will happen after they decode the human genome's blueprint? How will this DNA thing effect the "be"? In other words, as artists how are we going to begin making DNA Art?

Before beginning to predict about future, let's see what we have at hand? Let's brainstorm on this DNA thing a little bit more before we go into some more real examples. Again, how can you create a DNA Artwork? For example what if two artists come together, to put their DNA's together and try to create a (new) set of code. Meaning, two artists making a baby together, like we did with my darling Yeshim. Can this process be regarded as DNA Art or not? If not, why not? If yes, then it might also mean that, all the wedding ceremonies are in fact big DNA parties…All the family comes together and celebrates the future DNA code. The survival of the family code.

Anyway, what else could be genetic? Religion is not always genetic but nationality and race are. So, in fact genetics is in the core of ethics, politics and in fact everything. If DNA is in the core of politics and politics is in the core of art then DNA had always been in Art anyway, with family paintings, religious and royal themes in the classics. Is this an over-simplification? I don't think so.

Let's try to look with a different approach. If nation states are large DNA groups, should we consider nationalistic art as DNA artwork? What if the governments or institutions plan to make pure DNA Art by choosing artists according to their genetic code and begin making racist exhibitions like the Young British Artists Exhibitions? Giving prizes to only specific genetic British DNA or passport codes? Lets take the Turner prize, if you do not have the code you cannot even be nominated for this prize to become a young artist. (This year they enlisted a non-British artist for the first time, as a nominee for the Turner prize, maybe they are also reading NY Arts abroad!)

Last semester a French thinker Pierre Levi visited the New School University and gave a seminar about the relation of genetics and the web. In brief, he was very optimistic about the new technologies. He talked about the emergence of the prophetic artificial intelligence and argued for a new cultural and biological evolution. I personally criticised him by putting forward the translation problem of the web. He answered me using cybernetics and I argued saying that cybernetics talks about closed circuits which couldn't explain chaotic structures.

Actually web is the place where all codes come together. Still World Wide Web as itself can not be a miracle, if we do not participate and interact. For example, there's a new web-site called http://www.dna.com/ it is the ultimate DNA site. On this web site they are promoting a project called "The Gene Trust" which again, according to their argument, "has the potential to change medicine forever." OK. Yet they also wrote below: "But we can't do it without your help. We need hundreds of thousands of volunteers to fill out a health survey and thousands who match a specific profile to donate a sample of their blood. From there we can begin to understand the true relationship between genetics and disease. If you're interested in joining us, click the button below to register."

This connotation above made me to think of three things. The first one is; we need massive contribution for the improvement of information, any way. World Wide Web itself is a good source of information and it is the best channel for the fast information flow. (That is why Internet might have had lead to a digital revolution within special circumstances but of course it did not.) So even the super computers need massive human interaction and information. Secondly, we need new data but we do not need homogenised data. We need information from different peoples, from different races and ages. As diverse as possible. And to gather them we need to overcome the translation, accessibility and inequality problems. Thirdly, the ownership of this information is very important. Who will gather the information, how will you keep it and how will you hold on to this information? Who will use it and for what purpose? Another question, Will it become commercial or not? How will the relation of information and commerce evolve? The web should not be a one way information but it should enable a two-way dialogue. The people who provide information should also have the right to learn the research results for free.
It took me couple of months to work on this article that is why it is so diverted. And just before I finish my article, I learned that there are three new exhibitions downtown all related with Genetics. I realise that "Genetic Art" became the new cool hype after the stroller in NY. The first exhibition was at the Here Arts Gallery. It was called "PaperVeins Biennial" organised by the virtual PaperVeins Museum of Art.The second show I saw was "Paradise Now, Picturing the Genetic Revolution" at Exit Art. The third one was a solo of Suzanne Anker at Universal Concepts Unlimited, namely "code.X:genome".

In all three exhibitions not all the artwork but most of them was related with Genetics. All of the exhibitions ran through October. In the groups shows artist heavily used computers, tiny led screens, TV monitors, expensive equipment, biologic materials and references. In Exit Art some of the monitors but at Here Art most of the computers were not working. In all of the exhibitions the works were mostly about "Gene Art" instead of being "Gene Art."

Unlike "Paradise Now", "PaperVeins Biennial" has a more interdisciplinary structure almost like a "festival" as they name it. Among all the works I saw, Virgil Wong's "Genochoice" was very significant. In her virtual web art site she was relating e-commerce with gene modification. Here was her motto: "Choose your own genetically modified baby." This project can also be seen on the at http://www.genochoice.com/ or at http://www.alternativemuseum.org/ PaperVeins Biennial event has couple of more sites, http://www.paperveins.org/ and http://www.biennial.org/ so you can go and have a more detailed look at this clumsy-hi- bio-tech-edgy-funny exhibition and decide yourself.

"Paradise Now, Picturing the Genetic Revolution" at Exit Art, is a better funded and a very well designed show, I got impressed when I see it. When I e-mailed about the show to my publisher Abraham Lubelski and he replied me with these lines:
"I saw the show. Wasn't impressed. Very dated. Looks like 60's but let's see your work." At my second visit to the gallery I began to be more critical and began to find the show over descriptive even touristic. This exhibition also has a web site http://www.geneart.org/ where you can learn more about it.

I like virtual projects and maybe that is why I like the project of "Creative Gene Harvest Archive" with virtual co-curators Kim Trang and Karl Mihail. The project has a web site, which is

http://istanbulmuseum.org/muze/dergi/magazine/www.genegenies.com and you can apply to contribute to this project from the web. The strong part is, I am still not sure if it is for real or not. In the Paradise, liked the frogs of Brandon Ballengee. I think it is the closest example to trying to create DNA artwork. I liked the frogs also because they were alive. I tried to exhibit live lobsters as they are sold in China Town, with their claws tied, in an aquarium but at "Here Art Gallery" last spring. But the lobsters were gone at the first night. Working with animals requires respect in any case.

Another artist actually imagined a project to create a genetically modified "Green Rabbit" rabbit. But when you think about it, what Hitler tried to do with humans was quite similar. He tried to create a genetically modified race, with blue eyes and blond hair. So while playing with the Genes, artists positioning themselves with the previous Adolph experience is very crucial.

Nancy Burson has a very nice and interesting piece called "The Human Race Machine." But again in this interactive machine you have to choose a race and fit in the rigid prototypes. How can you classify and at the same time not discriminate? How can you transform a "Game Center photo machine" into a political work of art? How free you are when bound with multiple choices? It is not easy when you keep on thinking like the machines or for the machines.

The third exhibition I saw was at UCU showing Suzanne Anker's work. This project reminded me thefirst cave man seeing an UFO and than carving it on the wall. So direct, almost naïve. (I think Haluk Akakce's billboard promoting the Paradise was also related with this.)

Any way, I am trying to earn my life by writing and making web pages and I know that if you change a simple code on the page or make a small mistake, even a small (.) dot sign will get you in trouble and you might loose the whole site or the meaning of an article. Now when we are talking about a more complex system, the human life, or life in any form, how will you take the chance to change the code? Should DNA Art have to do with "keeping the code" or changing it? Again when we have the opportunity to change the code what will our references be? What is beautiful and what is healthy? Even in art and on the web we are experiencing representation problems so what will the criteria be in DNA?

DNA is an artwork of the Universe and we've already begun to play with the code itself. DNA might not be the ultimate code but it's still our code. And personally in my artwork I try to use ready found objects as they are and do not try to change or manipulate them, just shift their context. But while talking about the ready founds, do you really think that we will have the chance to be the same after getting exposed to so much of genetically altered food or industrial toxins?

An answer to some of these questions might be given with a reference to physics. In chaotic systems when there is input you can not calculate the amount of the end result but you can calculate that there will be an output. Artists should push the code to its endless limits but it should first (be).