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Art
as a way to live the genetic revolution Genetics
contributes to the over-signification of the body, a body which malleability
in our society becomes a cliché. As David Lebreton explains : "the body
is not only, in our contemporary societies, the assignation to an intangible
identity, the irreductible incarnation of the subject, its being to the
world, but a construction, an autharity of connection, a , a transitory
and manipulated object, capable of many (appariements)" (1).
The (unesco), in its universal declaration on the human (genome) (2) warns
the USA that if : "... the researches on the human (genome) and their
applications opens great perspectives of improvement for the individual
health but also for the entire humanity, ... they must, at the same time,
fully respect the dignity, the liberty and the human rights, without forgetting
the interdiction of any form of discrimination based on genetic characteritics".
The twenty five articles that constitute this declaration define the frame
in which should develop this ethical reflexion and the actions connected
with scientific and technical progresses in the domain of biology and
of genetics.
This declaretion reasserts that their using must respect the human rights
and his fondamental liberties. The existence of this declaration, even
if it proves that different States have already taken a responsible position
in front of these questions, is obviously not enough to forewarn humanity
of the possible consequences of our unforeseeable use of these sciences.
For sure this declaration will not be applied because it never happens
at a planetary level. Moreover, the moral consciousness and the collective
values of group of men at a precise period, are less induced by the official
texts than by the immediat profit, the reality of their environment (cultural,
social, historical, geographical). It
is about high time to create an art for living this technological revolution.
Time to imagine in full details all the possibilities to live our future
post-human body, by anticipating it (at maximum) and by imagining the
unthinkable.Anticipating future situations through fictions, experiencing
new tools in order to communicate on the issues of these sciences to the
largest number ,would contribute to prevent these scientific "progresses"from
escaping our control and from anarchically disrupting our relation to
our body and that of the others. It
id a context in which art can play an important role : to be a critical
and suspicious observer who proposes meaningless utopias to his contemporaries.
Stephane Baron has a good definition of this quality of art when he says
: "...Art conceptualise and expresses the utopias, and paradoxically,
art is also a place for resistance..." (3).
Finding an alternative to the increase of the distance between our body
and ourself, would help us to apprehend with serenity and a responsible
attitude the changes that are to come. At the level of the individual,
our apprehension or disinterest in these mutant questions maybe due to
a lack of mastering and analysis of these matters of body modifications.
To overpass them, we have to imagine and expierence ways of living the
different and potential consequences of the our new powers over life.
Making people individually feel responsible for these questions would
be a first step in the imagining of a new art of living our future mutations,
our choices and post-biological constraints. We have already established
the dangerous et morbid nature of eugenics which, under the name of science,
holds up to ridicule the fondamental right of the individuals to (make
use of) their bodies. What's the difference with "auto-eugenics" ?
Wonderings : What are we going to do ? When, how and to what extent are
we able to mutate ? The aims ? are at the origin of this notion. Auto-eugenics
represents our individual viewpoint and the expression of the limits to
impose to our soon coming genetic choices, everyone on his own body.
Now we must ask ourselve several questions highlighted by this term because
the revolution of life is nearly coming and has already happened. What
is the distance that still prevents us from the "Self-genetics Home-lab"
and its lovely user instructions : "How to enjoy your mutations in daily
life" or "The good mutations for your child" ? (4) In his "Letter on the
blinds to those who see", Diderot supposes the influence of our senses
over our morality. In the world of the Neuromancier by W. Gibson, one
can modify his senses and his physical abilities just thanks to a blue
card. If we transpose the hypothesis of Diderot in the world of the Neuromancier,
we can ask if this power on our body could be a power on our morality.
Would our personal ethics be more evolutive, thus radically transforming
our relation to ourselve and to the others ?
It is the case for example in "the Hollow Man" by Paul Verhoeven, the
faculty of being invisible destructs in the human (cobaye ) his respect
for the body of the others, and even committs to murdering and raping.
This destruction of the bodies of the others that surround him is provoked
by the traumatism that he suffers because he has lost his own body. By
losing the representation of our self, we are also losing the references
that constitute our universe, our (interface) with the"non self". In "the
Invisible Man" by Carpenter, the difficulties encountered by the hero
whose body has been altered, can be obviously noticed when he cannot find
his mouth to feed himself. If
our body could play a role in the construction of our moralty, then, in
a future, in which we could have the opportunity of transforming our perceptions,
just as Gibson anticipates it, " Kits of Bio configuration" might exist.
That of a phlosopher could be made of : That
of a murederer : Then,
depending on the daily mood, philosophical or murdering, after the shower
we would just have to plug the right kit. The body is a common and federating
place. Its characteristics gathers or separates groups of individuals
through means of needs, limits and of common or different intersts. The
nature of our body and the way we manage it are very signicant in our
social behaviour. How these behaviours would evoluate if there were more
and more different bio-plugged bodies with heterogeneous attributes and
abilities. The risks we are taking are proportionnal to our potential
actions. The rise of those we practice on our body, can confront us with
miracles but also horrors. We must prepare ourselve to apprehend from
an ethical and ecological viewpoint the revolution started by bio-sciences.
If the individual sensibilisation to these questions is a first step,
then art may be a way to reach it.
(1) David Lebreton is an anthropologist, Professor at the University Marc
Bloch, Strasbourg II. This text is taken from the introduction written
for the catalogue of the exhibition "Le corps mutant" organised in 2991
by the Enrico Navarra Galery.
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