Stelarc, Vito Acconci, Mike Parr, Paul Mc Carthy, and Chris burden

Stelarc

Stelarc is a performance artist who has visually probed and acoustically amplified his body. He has made 3 films of the inside of his body. Between 1976-1988 he completed 25 body suspension performances with hooks into the skin. He has used medical instruments, prosthetics, robotics, Virtual Reality systems, the Internet and biotechnology to explore alternate, intimate and involuntary interfaces with the body. He has performed with a THIRD HAND, a VIRTUAL ARM, a STOMACH SCULPTURE and EXOSKELETON, a 6-legged walking robot. His FRACTAL FLESH, PING BODY and PARASITE performances explored involuntary, remote and internet choreography of the body with electrical(Abbe 12) stimulation of the muscles. His PROSTHETIC HEAD is an embodied conversational agent that speaks to the person who interrogates it. He is surgically constructing an EXTRA EAR on his arm that will be internet enabled, making it publicly accessible acoustical organ for people in other places. He is presently performing as his avatar from his SECOND LIFE site. In 1995 Stelarc received a three year Fellowship from The Visual Arts/ Craft Board, The Australia Council and in 2004 was awarded a two year New Media Arts Fellowship. In 1997 he was appointed Honorary Professor of Art and Robotics at Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh. He was Artist-In-Residence for Hamburg City in 1997. In 2000 he was awarded an Honorary Degree of Laws by Monash University. (Adler 46) He has completed Visiting Artist positions in Art and Technology, at the Faculty of Art and Design at Ohio State University in Columbus in 2002, 2003 & 2004. He has been Principal Research Fellow in the Performance Arts Digital Research Unit and a Visiting Professor at The Nottingham Trent University, UK. He is currently Chair in Performance Art, School of Arts, Brunel University, Uxbridge, UK. He is also Senior Research Fellow and Visiting Artist at the MARCS Lab at the University of Western Sydney, Australia. Stelarc's artwork is represented by the SCOTT LIVESEY GALLERIES in Melbourne.

Why do you believe the human body is obsolete? What is the alternative?

This body is obsolete, absent, empty and performs largely involuntarily. I guess in retrospect, the suspension performances physically exhaust the body and expose its inadequacies and its limitations. The body has always been inadequate. This obsolete, absent and empty body needs to be augmented. It constructs instruments and machines to better perceive and manipulate the world. It's curiosity is amplified and further desires are generated. The media, machine and technological terrain that we inhabit generally outperforms the human body in speed, precision and power. We have taken an ergonomic approach in designing our instruments in the past, to deal with the limitations of our bodies-with the acuity of our sight, the responsiveness of our fingers and dealing with human fatigue. It's now time to redesign the body to better match the capabilities of its technology. (Abbe 12)

Your art involves the manipulation of your body via electronic controls. If humans begin augmenting themselves with brain chips and cybernetics doesn't ...