Week 4 | MedTech + Art
Nicole Chuhak
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| The room of the 4th ventricle of the brain |
This week's lesson focused on medical technologies and their relationships with art. One project that I found after watching the lessons was by Dr. Kai-hung Fung. In his project Dr. Fung discovered that not only did adding color to CT scans add to their medical value, but they also made some very "psychedelic" pieces of art (Herman). Another project that uses CAT scans, by Satre Stuelke, scans everyday items using the medical technology (Stuelke). These are instances of medical technologies being used to develop art, however some artists use medical technologies more actively in their projects.
The French artist Orlan has adapted medical technologies into her Carnal Art. She defines
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| An example of Stuelke's project |
Carnal Art as, "self-portraiture in the classical sense but made by means of today's technology." (Ornal) Ornal has taken the technologies of today's medical practices and used her own being as a canvas for her art. Not only does Orlan use her body in this manner, but she makes her decisions on what she wants from the surgeries
for meaningful reasons (Vesna). She chooses, "not for the canons of beauty they represent... but rather on account of the stories associated with them." (Dusinberre) While I think it is a bit extreme to undergo actual surgery in the name of art, I do think that Orlan's expression of respect for the women in her art is admirable. It is the most upfront example of the relationship between art and medical technologies, but in my opinion, pieces like those by Stuelke and Dr. Fung are not only like the art I would prefer to see, but also more respectful to the idea behind medical technologies. In my opinion, Orlan going under the knife in the name
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| A screenshot of Orlan's work |
of art is a bit disrespectful to the medical practices, almost as if she is making a mockery of doctors and their medical practices. It is for this reason that I am torn about her work, because it is a meaningful piece, but I think some more thought should have been put into its execution.
Sources:
Dusinberre, Deke. "Orlan: [carnal Art] ; following the Exhibition "Eléments Favoris" (November 28, 2002 - February 16, 2003) and ... to Coincide with the Exhibition "Orlan, Méthodes De L'artiste (March 31 - June 28, 2004)." Paris: Flammarion, 2004. Print.
Herman, Judith. "Psychedelic Images From Inside Your Body." Behold. Web. 25 Apr. 2015.
Orlan. "ORLAN OFFICIAL WEBSITE / SITE OFFICIEL D'ORLAN." Carnal Art / Art Charnel. Web. 26 Apr. 2015.
Stuelke, Satre. "Radiology Art: X-ray Art." Radiology Art: X-ray Art. Web. 25 Apr. 2015.
Vesna, Victoria. "Unit Four: MedTech + Art." Lecture. 2012
I also think that Orlan's methods are rather extreme. It makes me wonder sometimes if all these artists that perform modifications on their body care more about the "shock value" that is given to the audience than the message they are trying to carry. (Perhaps it is the same thing to them.) While I do not know if what Orlan is doing is 'disrespectful' to medical purposes, I somehow think the surgeons performing the surgery on her are under MORE pressure and had to put in more effort during those "surgical performances" than Orlan did.
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