exoskeleton

This technology developed to aid paraplegics' mobility, has been anticipated by Stelarc's much earlier experiments of the same name. In the case of the artist he was promoting hybridity for the sake of hybridity, and the application featured here is restoration of upright mobility.

studio 360 and NY gallery exhibit on plastic surgery

Well, Orlan does get mention here, but only a nod. The conceit of this exhibit is the plastic surgeon offering up his trade and products as fine art, with the hubris to claim Da Vinci, were he working today, would have been compelled to be doing nose jobs instead of the painting and sculptures he did. Poppycock. Anyway, it does seem to shift plastic surgery again into the realm of fine arts.

Not quite Stepford. . .

Updated this post in March 2015 because CNN took down it's video, but here's Aiko today: "Get your dirty hands off my face" she says. It's terrific cyborg disgust for the meat body. Previously CNN had Aiko in the news because her manufacturer, a lone developer, was low on funds and going public in his request for more money to take his robot to the next level.

A Verhoeven Robot: ED-209 (Enforcement Droid-209)

Here's this bit of robot nightmare from the 1984 film, Robocop.

The Swan, Season 2 Beauty Pageant

Exoskeleton--from performance art to commerce

In 1999 Australian performance artist Stelarc demonstrated modified bodily agency through his invention of the Exoskeleton, a mechanical hydraulic and electronic extension of his body, which changed the nature of his mobility and in various experiments, expanded the ability of his individual digits on his hands to grasp finer and smaller things through mini digits on the tips of each.

I'm not sure how long this video will be available, but CNN has a video report on a Utah company, Sarcos, which is manufacturing exoskeletons for military use, and the report is chock full of unqualified fascination and celebration for the developments. In the absence of Stelarc's uncanny emphases on the distortion of the human element in such hybrids, this report on Sarcos seems like a commercial for ED-209, the fictional robotic law enforcement robot that went awry with murderous malfunction in the film Robocop. Anyway, check out this link to the hyped-up next generation military technology for robotic hybrids for military use. No mention of cost, or the effect on the human operator over time, but something tells me a day spent in the exoskeleton leaves the operator somehow changed.

Here's Stelarc demonstrating his Exoskeleton in 1999. Keep in mind that he typically drives the legs and other attachments with voluntary muscles from unrelated places in his body. For example, his third hand, which he performs with often, is driven by abdominal and leg muscles, not by his arm or hand muscles.

Sideshow freaks and repressive state apparatuses

Here is Erik Sprague, a former doctoral candidate and philosophy degree holder, known around the world for his amazing transformation from man to lizard as well as his modern sideshow performance art. A proud freak. Personally, I'm not a big fan of the nose flossing, or other sideshow undertakings Sprague does in his act, but he is clearly a thoughtful agent of change and his discussion of the medical procedures behind his body modification project is rich with observations about the social importance of regulating the human body. In particular, his filed teeth and bifurcated tongue have caused a movement to form around writing laws to make such body modifications illegal, thus invoking and Althusserian repressive state apparatus to protect us from turning ourselves into lizard people.

While Erik Sprague occupies the low culture sideshow stages, his high culture colleagues, Strelarc and Orlan, among others, explore related boundaries in their surgical interventions, which are displayed and exhibited in gallery spaces and universities.

Here's Lizard Man speaking about his origins and some of the procedures.