Microbial Memories: A Speculative Design Workshop
What do terroir, microorganisms, and archives have in common? Join us to brainstorm creative uses of microbiomes as databases of memory.
Take a sip of wine. Eat a bite of good chocolate. Try different ones. Can you tell the difference? Does it evoke memories? Do you associate those bites and sips with particular places?
Fermented foods (like wine and chocolate) have often been associated with terroir: “an expression of the land.” Makers of these foods often seek ways to more cleanly express a sense of place and time, and have searched for centuries to unlock the mystery of terroir.
Recent research has shown that environmental microbiomes -- the particular communities of microorganisms present in a wine must, for example -- correlate strongly with particular places and times of production, which raises a question: how can we use microorganisms as a method of recording information?
In this workshop, we'll explore the unique ability of different kinds of life forms to sense, encode, and interpret information. We’ll then dive into the potential for metagenomics to give us new tools for encoding histories. Finally, we will take what we’ve learned and create speculative applications of microbial archives to come up with our own science fictions and potential futures. No previous experience needed!
This workshop is a follow-up to a speculative project between the facilitators, which you can view here: www.timeplaceculture.com
Your registration gets you access to the live Zoom class, along with a recording of the class to view afterwards.
Accessibility Statement: Genspace is committed to ensuring that our online classes, events, and workshops are as accessible as possible, and can meet the ever-changing needs of our community. As we navigate the opportunities and challenges of online programming, we are constantly learning and adjusting our workflows to prioritize accessibility, and we’d love to hear any feedback our community might have. Please contact us if you have specific accessibility requests or questions.
What do terroir, microorganisms, and archives have in common? Join us to brainstorm creative uses of microbiomes as databases of memory.
Take a sip of wine. Eat a bite of good chocolate. Try different ones. Can you tell the difference? Does it evoke memories? Do you associate those bites and sips with particular places?
Fermented foods (like wine and chocolate) have often been associated with terroir: “an expression of the land.” Makers of these foods often seek ways to more cleanly express a sense of place and time, and have searched for centuries to unlock the mystery of terroir.
Recent research has shown that environmental microbiomes -- the particular communities of microorganisms present in a wine must, for example -- correlate strongly with particular places and times of production, which raises a question: how can we use microorganisms as a method of recording information?
In this workshop, we'll explore the unique ability of different kinds of life forms to sense, encode, and interpret information. We’ll then dive into the potential for metagenomics to give us new tools for encoding histories. Finally, we will take what we’ve learned and create speculative applications of microbial archives to come up with our own science fictions and potential futures. No previous experience needed!
This workshop is a follow-up to a speculative project between the facilitators, which you can view here: www.timeplaceculture.com
Your registration gets you access to the live Zoom class, along with a recording of the class to view afterwards.
Accessibility Statement: Genspace is committed to ensuring that our online classes, events, and workshops are as accessible as possible, and can meet the ever-changing needs of our community. As we navigate the opportunities and challenges of online programming, we are constantly learning and adjusting our workflows to prioritize accessibility, and we’d love to hear any feedback our community might have. Please contact us if you have specific accessibility requests or questions.
Meet the Instructor
Sara Nejad (she/ her) is a New York based artist and interaction designer with a multidisciplinary background in HCI and biodesign. She explores the convergence of experience design, synthetic biology and engineering to speculate and design biointerfaces and closed-loop systems -with the aid of microorganisms- for long duration space exploration. Sara has an M.S. in Integrated Digital Media from New York University(2020). Follow her @saranejadart.
Meet the Instructor
Nikhil Kumar (he/ him) is a multimedia artist working primarily with biomaterials and sound, and a product manager with experience in ed-tech, food, data science, and neurotech. His favorite author is, on most days, Italo Calvino, and his favorite city, on most days, is also where he lives -- New York City. He is an avid fermenter and former chef, which was one of his entry-points into the field of biodesign. He is currently pursuing his graduate studies at NYU Tisch’s ITP, and has a BS in economics from the Wharton School at UPenn.