Bioart and Bacteria - The Artwork of Anna Dumitriu
Anna Dumitriu’s work blurs the boundaries between art and science with a strong interest in the ethical issues raised by emerging technologies. Her installations, interventions and performances use a range of digital, biological and traditional media including live bacteria, robotics, interactive media, and textiles. Her work has a strong international exhibition profile and is held in several major public collections, including the Science Museum in London. Dumitriu is known for her work as founder and director of “The Institute of Unnecessary Research”, a group of artists and scientists whose work crosses disciplinary boundaries and critiques contemporary research practice. She recently completed a Wellcome Trust commission entitled “The Hypersymbiont Salon", is collaborating as a Visiting Research Fellow: Artist in Residence with the Adaptive Systems Research Group at The University of Hertfordshire (focussing on social robotics) and (Leverhulme Trust 2011) Artist in Residence on the UK Clinical Research Consortium Project “Modernising Medical Microbiology” at The University of Oxford. Her major international project “Trust me I’m an artist, towards an ethics of art/science collaboration” (in collaboration with the Waag Society in Amsterdam and The University of Leiden) investigates the novel ethical problems that arise when artists create artwork in laboratory settings. She is also a contributing editor to Leonardo Electronic Almanac, and winner of the 2012 Society for Applied Microbiology Communication Award. Dumitriu was recently awarded Wellcome Trust funding for her new project "The Romantic Disease: An Artistic Investigation of Tuberculosis". Click the links at the top of this section to explore the site and find out more about key projects. For more information contact annadumitriu@hotmail.com
Several works by Anna Dumitriu are currently being exhibited as part of “Gone Viral: Medical Science and Contemporary Textile Art” at the Cathy and Jesse Marion Art Gallery, Rockefeller Arts Center, State University of New York, Fredonia, NY, USA. The show also features textile works by Sonya Clark, Lindsay Obermeyer, Paddy Hartley and Laura Splan and is curated by art historian Leesa Rittelmann. Exhibits by Dumitriu include The Infective Textiles Dress, The MRSA Quilt, Bed Flora and The Art and Science of Linen which looks at the whole ecology of linen production from the bacteria used to break down the flax in retting tanks to the industrial production of linen. The exhibition runs from 8th March - 7th April 2013. Dumitriu also gave a public lecture on 7th March 2013 as part of the gallery’s visiting artist programme. It is hoped that the exhibition will then tour. See images here.
Anna Dumitriu has been awarded the 2012 Society for Applied Microbiology Communications Award in the Professional Communicator Category. She will attend the society’s summer conference to accept the award. Dumitriu said “I am so pleased that my work over many years has been recognised in this way, it’s a great honour. In my work I try to allow others (non-scientists) a way into the fascinating and sublime world of bacteria and understand some of issues that affect us today”. Find out more here.
