Future Earth
Issue 60 September 2020
A visceral encounter with the near future
Heather Dewey-Hagborg is an artist and biohacker who is interested in art as research and technological critique. Her controversial biopolitical art practice includes the project ‘Stranger Visions’ in which she created portrait sculptures from analyses of genetic material (hair, cigarette butts, chewed up gum) collected in public places.
Human-Virus relationships
Pei-Ying Lin is an artist / designer from Taiwan and currently based in Eindhoven, the Netherlands. Her main focus is on the combination of science and human society through artistic methods and is particularly interested in building a common discussion ground for different cultural perspectives regarding elements that construct our individual perception of the world.
Loneliness, Helping Hands, TRUTH
Between mid-May and the end of June 2020 linguist and author, Florian Coulmas, questioned people around the world about their personal experiences of the Covid-19 pandemic. ‘Loneliness, Helping Hands, TRUTH’ is the response he received.
In Posse: Making female sperm
Charlotte Jarvis is an artist and lecturer working at the intersection of art and science. Her practice often utilises living cells and DNA: “I have recorded music onto DNA, seen my heart beat outside of my body and am currently making the world’s first female sperm. My work explores the body as a liminal space – a site for transformation, hybridisation and magic”. In Posse is a work In progress: “A mission to make ‘female’ sperm from my own stem cells”.
Future Blueprint
Jasmine Pradissitto is an international artist, innovator, and speaker with a background in physics based in London. Inspired by nature, the human condition, the mythopoetic and a more sustainable future, her forms create a commentary on an unsustainable, increasingly Anthropocene world slowly being reshaped by the things we consume and then disregard. She creates work that builds awareness about diminishing air quality and biodiversity extinction.
Futurology: how a group of visionaries looked beyond the possible a century ago and predicted today’s world
Max Saunders is Professor of English and Co-Director of the Centre for Life-Writing Research at King’s College London, where he teaches modern literature. From September 2019 he will be Interdisciplinary Professor of Modern Literature and Culture at the University of Birmingham.
He was awarded a Leverhulme Major Research Fellowship from 2008-10 to research the To-Day and To-Morrow book series. His resulting book on the series and futurology, ‘Imagined Futures’, is published by Oxford University Press (2019).
Is humanity doomed because we can’t plan for the long term? Three experts discuss
Robin Dunbar is Professor of Evolutionary Psychology, Department of Experimental Psycology, University of Oxford. His research is concerned with trying to understand the behavioural, cognitive and neuroendocrinological mechanisms that underpin social bonding in primates (in general) and humans (in particular).
Chris Zebrowski is a Lecturer in Politics and International Relations, Loughborough University. His research analyses the concept of resilience in the context of the changing rationalities and practices of risk management and security.
Per Olsson is a Researcher, Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University. He is a transdisciplinary researcher and has worked in the interface of natural and social sciences and humanities. His current research focuses on agency and system entrepreneurship, social-ecological innovations, transformations to sustainability, and how to reverse current trends of crossing critical thresholds and tipping points in the Earth system.
Fridays for Future: how the young climate movement has grown since Greta Thunberg’s lone protest
Benjamin Bowman is a youth studies specialist with broad academic background in politics, the politics of youth, and especially young people’s activism. Benjamin works with the Manchester Centre for Youth Studies, and is Lecturer in Youth Justice at Manchester Metropolitan University.
How an AI trained to read scientific papers could predict future discoveries
Marcello Trovati is a Reader in the Department of Computer Science at Edge Hill University. His research interests include mathematical modelling, the science of Big Data, including data and text mining, and their applications to multi-disciplinary topics.
Sci-fi author William Gibson: how ‘future fatigue’ is putting people off the 22nd century
Andre Spicer is Professor of Organisational Behaviour, Cass Business School, City, University of London. His main expertise is in the area of organizational behaviour. In particular he has done work on organizational power and politics, identity, the creation of new organizational forms, space and architecture plays at work and more recently leadership.
Biodiversity loss could be making us sick – here’s why
Jake M. Robinson is a PhD Researcher, Department of Landscape, University of Sheffield. A professional ecologist and planetary health researcher with experience in both terrestrial and marine environments, his current research interests centres around three topics:
1. The environment-microbiome-health axis: investigating the relationship between microbes, the health of humans (noncommunicable and infectious diseases) and the wider environment
2. Remote sensing: using innovative technology to acquire and analyse remote data, particularly for biodiversity conservation and ecological restoration
3. Investigating nature-based solutions within planetary, one and eco-health frameworks
The Camille Diaries: New Artistic Positions on M/otherhood, Life and Care
The exhibition and the symposium ‘The Camille Diaries: New Artistic Positions on M/Otherhood, Life and Care’ (at ArtLaboratoryBerlin) presents new artistic works by eleven international artists:- Sonia Levy, Mary Maggic, Naja Ryde Ankarfeldt, Baum & Leahy, Špela Petric, Margherita Pevere, Ai Hasegawa, Nicole Clouston, Cecilia Jonsson and Tarah Rhoda. Under the current conditions of our world (the environmental crises, gender aspects, biopolitics, etc.), the artists reflect the term “motherhood” in a greatly expanded form, namely as a ‘taking care of’, as an interpersonal relationship.