Naturally selected and intelligently designed

[this is my obsession with a concept, not an idea for an art project exactly]
I have, in the last month, become obsessed with natural selection. Every conversation I have, article I read, and project I work on has become about natural selection.
It started with a project given to me by Michael Rees, my professor in an individual study on Industrial Design, which was to do a complete analysis of an orange from a design aspect. Initially I thought it was ridiculous but then I started thinking: this orange has been design by natural selection- an unbiased, objective selector that has one goal: the reproduction of the species, and chooses the aspects of the orange (or plant or animal) based on whether they help to further the goal. Which means that every plant or animal we see on earth has been the best it has ever been in existence (with the except ion of the rare case of a bad mutation, which will work itself out in the long run). Which means every aspect of the orange has a reason for people there because if it didn’t help the orange reproduce, then it wouldn’t stay around- it would be replaced by something that did. The analysis isn’t important- the concept is.
I began thinking about human beings as being designed- t his came about in a conversation with my friend Mike. He was saying that human beings are so advances, etc- which is not a dumb claim- we can move very fast, we have opposable things, our eyes are pretty good, also our smell, hearing, etc. We have the ability to think quickly, problem solve, build tools, etc. However, I then began to think that for each of the things that I listed- there are other animals who do it better (except, maybe for, problem solving- but I’ll get to that later). Panthers run faster, hawks see better, dogs smell better, lions hunt better, etc. While we are very good building tools- just recently scientists discovered apes in the wild that had build spears to hunt- so we aren’t the only tool builders.
Now, as for problem solvers- it seems as thought that is what we are good at. because we have buildings, bridges, airplanes, clothing, computers, sensors, guns, bombs, etc. But this is where I started to question just how smart we are- what is important here? what is the goal? The subject human-centric goal seems to be- conquer as much land, influence others as much as possible, gain power over others, gain money, gain beauty, etc. However, the objective goal of existences, according to Darwin, is not that- it is to continue existing. How are humans doing on that goal? We are depleting our resources, killing each other, overshooting our population capacity for our land, poisoning our biosphere (that we depend on for existence) etc. So if Darwin is right about what is important, we aren’t doing so well. In fact, if you view earth taking a step back- and, from our scientific knowledge, that the earth has been around for millions of years before humans- then human beings will look like a little random mutation that wasn’t good for reproduction, a failure of a mutation, and that worked itself out (i.e. we worked ourselves out of existence). How? we fought against natural selection- our medicine and anti-aging procedures helped keep those not best suited for evolution alive. Our societies replaced physical work and exercise with machines and virtual worlds, so that we became dependent on electricity and things outside of our control for our basic necessities. We forgot how to hunt for ourselves, cook for ourselves, prepare our food, build shelter, etc. In ancient times, heavier women were celebrated because it meant they were better prepared to have children (wide hips)- today? not so much. Once you start thinking about it, more and more examples pop out in everyday life.

mor(t)ality

this is a project that I completed and installed for an exhibition group show set up by Alex Conner in the New Brunswick Train Station. Here is a copy of the article in the Star Ledger on it.
Conner’s concept for the show, which was called “Art in the Medium of Cardboard and Photocopy- New Brunswick’s Past and Present”- here is a clip of what he wrote about the show: “With the erratic influx of industry back into the city over the past twenty-five years, one can see the identities of economic prosperity and economic disparity coexisting in the streets of New Brunswick every day. The cardboard boxes used to bring in financial files for local banking headquarters are discarded with the trash and serve as bedding and shelter for some of the city's homeless. Thousands of photocopied documents created exclusively for and by local industry are read and then thrown away by all members of the community. Whether the document pertains to a managerial memo or a New Brunswick Police Bulletin, this creation and destruction of information everyday cheapens the message transmitted therein, and creates a sense of disillusionment with the medium of photocopy."

My piece was 2 almost-life-size cardboard people- one of them a man, sitting against the wall, his elbows on his knees, looking down (supposedly a homeless person, though that isn’t really specific exactly and it doesn’t really matter). The other, standing in front of the sitting man, facing away, is a businessman, with a briefcase in one hand, talking on a cell phone. (see pictures)

The name sort of came to me randomly but I liked it a lot- how a cardboard box is used to carry ‘”important” documents to the businessman, thrown away, used as a bed or blanket for a homeless person- the cardboard being treated as unimportant by the business man when really it is a valuable material. Similarly, there are people in a society that are discarded as useless and unimportant, when that is not the case. Further, both people are made out of the same disposable material- despite that they may be different shapes and stand differently, we are all disposable and our lifetimes are limited. and maybe if this mortality was more widely recognized, people might act a little different towards each other. If we realized that being businessman in a big corporation doesn’t make you better or more important- and that these businesses are man-made, of inflated importance, and in the long run a ridiculous waste of time and resources, then morality would be treated differently as well.

heroes. with mayo on the side.

Concept: Heroes or false heroes or false idols, etc

Background: in doing research on Thomas Edison, I discovered that there is a lot about Thomas Edison that you don’t learn in school. (1) He did not invent the light bulb- the idea of the light bulb had been tried out for almost 80 years before Edison came along. He is only known for having used a certain type of light bulb- which he didn’t even invent- he stole the idea from Joseph Swan, who then sued Edison for patent infringement. Edison lost and was forced to bring Swan into his business as a 50% partner. Edison then bought out Swan and continued working.

Why is this important: I want to used this as one of several pieces in a series on heroes- it struck me how much we are lied to as children about so much- people talk about unlearning what we were taught- and it makes me think- no one there is so much depression and lying and cheating- we are brought up with heroes based on lies. Etc.

Idea: have a series of art pieces that reflect this theme
Topics/Heroes: (each with blurb explaining truth about hero)
1. Edison- a sculpture of a wire that spells out the word deceit in script- leading to the “i” which is a light bulb, and then the other wire finishing the word. Maybe the whole piece mounted on unfinished wood. Or maybe finished wood?
2. Founding fathers, writing about men created equal, and bills of rights, owned slaves
3. Thomas Jefferson fathered an illegimate child with a slave
4. Lincoln suspended habeas corpus and set the precedent of suspending rights of people during war times
5. Police- taught to trust people in school (possible to get kids book about cops) and replace one page with newspaper article on brutality- Rodney king or child shot for having toy gun).
6. brothers grim
7. ghandi beat his wife
Other idea: bad people who did things that lead to good things in history:
8. LBJ/JFK- if JFK hadn’t been killed, LBJ would not have been able to do a lot of good things.