“Facing 21st Century Nature: Configuring Fresh Approaches Through Biodesign”

Rachel Armstrong - Professor of Experimental Architecture, Newcastle University

Biotechnology presents a dynamic new set of solutions to material challenges ranging from the body to the nonhuman realm and environment. While the radical potential of biotechnology can partly be achieved through new tools, the frameworks for the practice of biodesign are also important in generating systemic transformation in how we work and live in the 21st century. As an expression of “living” systems, biodesign interrogates biotechnological innovation by holding ideas to account, and particularly, in exploring the potential opportunities and dangers of manipulating life. 

Drawing on a range of examples, this talk and exhibition outline the multidisciplinary, convergent, radically creative nature of biodesign, and how it asks searching questions of what it means to be “human.”