Poster design: Megan Broughton (CalArts BFA 3 art student)
The interdisciplinary arts collective Strophe launches a new lecture series, Novum: A Compendium of Theories, Ideas, & Explorations For the Curious and the Creative, tomorrow night (Jan. 22) in Los Angeles.
Curated by CalArts’ School of Critical Studies alumnae Janice Lee (MFA 08) and Laura Vena (MFA 08), the series is poised to present new and unusual ideas, “bringing together explorations and investigations from the fields of art, writing, science, history, religion, and philosophy.”
The inaugural event, “The Biotechnic Opera: Eat the Mouth That Feeds You,” features readings by Critical Studies faculty member Arne de Boever and writer-artist Carribean Fragoza (Critical Studies MFA 10). The Fallen Fruit Collective (founded by another Critical Studies faculty member, Matias Viegener, and alumnus David Burns [Art BFA 93]) has a surprise presentation in store that fits the evening’s theme.
De Boever’s lecture “New Norms for Living” echoes a recent CalArts course cluster on bio-art. He’ll raise questions such as these:
Early on in The Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle asks what might be the work of the human being: not of the carpenter or the tanner, but of the human being as such? The question takes on new urgency in a time of crisis, in which our most basic forms of living are under threat. Such a situation raises the need for an exploration of new techniques of living or new biotechnologies. But how does this need for new biotechnologies relate to the so-called crisis?
Strophe: The Biotechnic Opera: Eat the Mouth That Feeds You,
Avenue 50 Studio
131 N. Avenue 50
Highland Park (LA), Calif.
$5-10 suggested donation