Bear 71, is a very unique documentary indeed – not only is it narrated by a suicidal bear, but it is interactive. The interface allows the viewer to digitally explore a landscape of motion sensor cameras in Banff National Park, whilst the talking bear recites melancholic anecdotes.
Although it is a slightly confusing format, the documentary contains a worthy message. Conceptually very interesting, graphically beautiful, great soundtrack, irksome voice over.
Read MoreMussel Power is a community initiative aiming to integrate segregated communities in Hackney. The social and tactile process of eating mussels along with conditions necessary to farm them informs living spaces within the tower. Mussels are grown in acrylic glass tubing, the infrastructure which governs the whole building. A closed loop system where neighbourhood pollution is used for the cultivation of algae to power the building and feed the aquacultural systems is also key to the program. The main architectural theme of the project is primarily transparency and fluidity, investigating whether both a functional structure and semi-transparent partitioning system might dictate the use of space.
For the recent RCA “Work in Progress” show, a fragment of the tower was modelled at 1:50 (photographed below), exploring potential water flow systems through mussel grow tubes and utilisation as semi-transparent partitions.
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Since our Work in Progress show in January, my project – Farming the Unconscious – has received a fair bit of online attention, especially after a rather scandalous article was published on Wired.co.uk.
It has subsequently appeared on numerous other sites, from extremeskins.com – the official message board of the Washington Redskins – to GlobalMeatNews.com. The ensuing commentary and tweeting has been as ferocious as it is plentiful, with words like, ‘Shocking’, ‘Creepy’, ‘Disturbing’ and ‘wtf!’ appearing most frequently.
As the project moves forward and becomes architectural, it will seek to quell such public outrage through education and transparency. It is imperative that the consumer of the 21st century is an informed consumer, and that as a maket actor they understand the significance of their market actions.
The Centre for Unconscious Farming will offer a level of transparency and openness that should be demanded of all manufactures of consumables.
Here is the full transcript of my interview with Wired.co.uk, as I don’t believe the article accurately represented the tone of the project and its intensions.
My research into the current paradigm of meat consumption brought to light a number of issues, and two, in particular have influenced the project.
Firstly, the livestock industries are responsible for 18% of all greenhouse gas emissions, around 40% more than the entirety of the transport sector. This is worrying because the demand for meat is increasing worldwide and is set to double by 2050, with 40% of this increase predicted to be in the poultry industry.
So I propose consolidation and densification of the industry, bringing production closer to consumption.
Secondly, the welfare provided in the existing dominant systems – including, free-range in my opinion – is wholly inadequate. This led me to ask the seemingly paradoxical question: How might we achieve this necessary increase in the density of production whilst also addressing the issue of welfare?
Desensitisation is my answer.
2. Your proposed solution seems fairly shocking, but how does it compare to existing mass production processes?
I think it is often difficult to tell the difference between what something ‘is’ and how something feels. The emotional gut reaction that we feel when we see something ‘repulsive’ or ‘frightening’, is a response that has evolved in order to help us avoid things that may cause us harm – like blood, or shit or just the unfamiliar.
The realities of the existing systems of production are just as shocking, but they are hidden behind the sentimental guise of tradition farming scenes that we as consumers hold in our minds and see on our food packaging.
I filmed this video of the slaughter of chickens at an organic chicken farm. At this farm they practice a superb method of husbandry and although the slaughter is humane, it is still ‘shocking’.
There are numerous differences between the current dominant production systems and the one I am proposing, but the fundamental difference is the removal of suffering. Whether what I am proposing is an appropriate means to achieve the removal of suffering is open to interpretation. In reality this should be decided at the level of the individual consumer, at the counter, handing over their money and ‘voting’ for their system of preference.
3. How does this proposed idea compare with other “in vitro” meats?
I guess the intentions are the same – the synthesis of animal protein without the suffering – but as far as I am aware, in vitro technology is still very much in its infancy and they are yet to be able to synthesise blood vessels which are necessary in the creation of three dimensional pieces of meat. It will be interesting to watch how much of the animal they will have to rebuild before production becomes commercially viable.
4. What would be the biggest challenge in getting to the point where this could become a reality?
It would obviously need conventional scientific trials and I imagine the start up costs for a system of this complexity may be prohibitive.
Hopefully this would be mitigated by the productivity of the system, which I estimate could achieve a density of 11.7 chickens/m3 as opposed to 3.2 chickens/m3, which is achieved in a conventional broiler house. The cost/benefit analysis has yet to be calculated.
Furthermore, there is widespread public distrust in technologically ‘designed’ food and this system would need address this phobia if it were to become a reality.
5. Is this just the Matrix for chickens?
The similarities are patent although in The Matrix the dominant species were kind enough to provide the sub-species with a alternate reality, which was far better than the their ‘real’ post-apocalyptic world. This was a lovely gesture by ‘The Machines’, but the chickens in this system will not be privy to such luxuries and will reside in oblivion.
Read MoreA towering retreat at Old Street Roundabout harvesting foreign fruits of the world at Global Destinations in London.
{2040} London is its own microclimate, pulsating heat, absorbing and releasing water. Whilst the temperature of the UK has risen by 2°C, summer heat waves hit London regularly topping 40°C. Bananas, Pineapples and Figs are all fruits of England.
Harvesting heat from London’s Urban Heat Island, Equi-HOT-el will turn waste into luxury. With the growth of the exotic food industry can we cross- fertilize our desire for an exotic landscape with food production?
The model depicts the strategic organisation and dialogue between human and plant inhabitation within Equi-HOT-el. Latitudinal lines are used to allocate temperate zones, and Holiday destinations are positioned accordingly.
The Hydroponic structure, taking inspiration from the properties of the sunflower becomes a key structural component. An inhabitable wall is explored as a room typology penetrating different temperate and growing zones.
Read MoreThe mechanisation of agriculture has engendered an entire industry; the industrial agricultural machinery market was estimated at some £3.8 billion in 2010, while exports for tractors, agricultural machinery and outdoor power equipment accounted for a further £1.5 billion. As we require ever increasing amounts of food, it is inevitable that increasing industrialisation and mechanisation will be integrated into a future agriculture. We’ve been alerted to the possibility of robotics in our homes and we’ve embraced them in manufacture and production; but agriculture still manages to be depicted as a simplistic manual and physical process. Even documentaries such as Our Daily Bread, which looks without commenting into the places where food is produced in Europe, describing monumental spaces, surreal landscapes, and cool, industrial environments which feature minimal organic forms, do not go far enough in exposing the amount of mechanisation deployed in current farming. People, animals, and crops play a supporting role in the logistics of this highly machinic system which provides our society’s standard of living.
Varieties of Rice Milling Machines
Exposing some of the highly mechanical practices which are used to provide our produce explores a new vernacular; these strange contraptions mimic organic processes but formally create novel machinic elements. These are just some of the machines used in current agricultural processes.
Industrial Egg Incubators
Industrial Rice Grader
Nathan Meltz’s work highlights the infiltration of the industrial into our food chain. His stylisitic collages suggest that the contemporary world of nanotechnology and genetic modification is retrofitted with analog mechanical parts, creating a hybrid world of organified machinery.
The Chicken Coup from Nathan Meltz on Vimeo.
He says of his work ‘I wanted a visual metaphor that would reveal tech taking over plants and animals. Unfortunately, our most current tech can be hard to visualize. A series of ones and zeros? Some sort of digital technology? I decided to combine elements of Dada collage with early modernist German machine aesthetic. In my machine world, animals are put on assembly lines, cramped together in feed lots, and, in the case of the chickens in The Chicken Coup animation, reside in an agricultural system designed by sadists.’
Nathan also works on Screen prints of hyper machinic constructions and hybridised spaces suggesting a future farm where the machines themselves might grow.
The Pig Pen
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Pasona is the second largest staffing company in the Japanese multinational corporation industry. The company provides services such as temporary staffing, recruiting, outplacement and outsourcing. Its spectacular headquarters are based near Tokyo Station in the capital’s banking district. Their new eco-offices in Marounchi are open to the public for an inspiring visit.
The urban farm in total covers around 16,500 sq m and contains over 200 plants including tomatoes, cucumbers, lettuces, peppers, egg plants and of course the rice field based on the first floor, visible and accesible from the street. The interior spaces provide a disease and pesticide free environment far from anything that can affect the crop’s growth.
‘Stop-Don’t feed too much water’, the beginning of the growth inside the office’s drawers.
The young corn field.
The office’s staff, two thousand in total, is responsible of taking care of the rice and the other vegetables, which decreases the CO2 emissions of the building by up to 2 tons a year. However the objective of this experimental project has not only been ecological.
There has been an improvement in team skills and communication amongst the employees due to the gardening duties performed in a daily basis. They learn wholly new things and interact with each other in ways they would never encounter in a working environment.
An employee at work taking care of the tomato plant!
The rice paddy photographed by Cecilia Macaulay. The autumn crop is drying in the background.
The rice paddy is harvested three times a year because the cultivation facilities are an improvement on usual natural conditions which yields just one annual crop. Each time the Pasona farmers can get 50kg of rice from the field. This is then used in the staff canteen on the ninth storey; though it doesn’t feed all two thousand employees in the building it adds up to roughly three thousand onigiri rice balls a year.
They brighten the HELF lights and bring them down as the rice plant desires. I tends to be up to 5 lux during most months and up to 10 lux when the rice kernels are ripening.
The second floor introduces meeting spaces, with relaxed and informal green surroundings.
Hydroponically grown lettuce on polystyrene.
Specially configured VIP meeting room with temperatures for tomatoes to grow in.
This is a very successful example that not all of us need to be farmers to know how to grow crops and produce food. These employees have other priorities in their daily schedule within their work environment. However with the addition of looking after the crops, they tend to get more energetic and productive and their lifestyle certainly changes to a more eco-aware, responsible and considerate member of society.
Information from Japan Trends, Photographs from Christina Varvia
Mushrooms are the reproductive organs (“fruiting bodies”) of much larger living entities – Mycelium. These spend most of their time hidden from view, living underground or eating the insides of dead and dying trees as a giant matrix of cells. They act as nature’s recyclers living of dead and decaying matter, leading to speculation that mycelium could be a major agent in environmental recovery (see Paul Stamets research)
However mycelium’s ability to turn decaying matter into a solid yet biodegradable mass has led to more esoteric exploration of mycological possibilities. At the more practical end the company Ecovative has began growing new materials – starting with a natural replacement for polystyrene packaging
From agricultural waste, such as wood chips or wheat chaff, these solid mycelial masses are grown into any form, creating a environmental but cheap packaging that uses no petrochemicals and is completely biodegradable.
Companies have began to take notice – Dell have began testing EcoCradel as packing for their computers.
The ability to grow solid mass suggests interesting architectural possibilities. The artist Phill Ross has been experimenting with growing a mycelium architecture. In his 2009 piece Mycotecture, he constructed a teahouse constructed entirely from mycelium bricks.
Over the course of the exhibition the structure was gradually turned into mushroom tea, served to the visitors, until nothing was left.
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RCA Design Interactions 2008, Revital Cohen
” Could animals be transformed into medical devices?” and “Could a transgenic animal function as a whole mechanism and not simply supply the parts? Could humans become parasites and live off another organism’s bodily functions?”
Revital’s scenario imagine that, in the future, a patient suffering from kidney failure would give a blood sample to lab scientists who then isolate in the genome the regions that code for blood production (bone marrow tissues), and immune response (the major histocompatibility complex), extract the genome from the nucleus of a somatic cell taken from a sheep and substitute the corresponding regions of the sheep’s genome with the DNA from the patients’ genome.
This recombinant DNA is then inserted into the nucleus of a pre-prepared sheep egg cell. After cell division in the egg is initiated, the egg is implanted into a surrogate ewe which will eventually give birth to a transgenic lamb.
During the day, the dialysis sheep roams in the donor patient’s back garden, grazes to cleanse its kidneys, and drinks water containing salt minerals, calcium and glucose.
At night, the sheep is placed at the patient’s bedside. The transgenic sheep’s kidneys are connected via blood lines to the patient’s fistula (a surgically enlarged vein). During the night, waste products from the patient’s blood are pumped out of the body, filtered through the sheep’s kidney and the blood is returned, cleaned, to the patient. This happens over and over again throughout the night. The day after, the sheep urinates the toxins.
GREYHOUND LUNGS:
Another of “Life Support”‘s projects aims to use greyhounds as artificial lungs for patients who require ventilators to breathe. The device works by strapping a bellows to a retired racing dog (one that would be euthanized anyway) and having it chase a bunny while on a treadmill. As the dog runs, it’s increased lung movements pump the bellows, providing air for a human patient
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Bioluminescence (in common use, also known as phosphorescence) is exhibited by a wide variety of oceanic organisms, from bacteria to large squids and fish. The light is generated chemically and emitted when a flavin pigment, luciferin, is oxidized in the presence of luciferase, an enzyme also produced by the organism (the chemical system is like that of fireflies). Most of the homogeneous phosphorescence of the sea, the glowing wakes, is caused by the presence of blooming phytoplankton.
Bioluminescence in the Gippsland Lakes by Phil Hart in 2008.
Recently, scientists at UC San Diego have made a bioluminescent bacterial billboard. They call it a “living neon sign composed of millions of bacterial cells that periodically fluoresce in unison like blinking light bulbs.” Making it all work “involved attaching a fluorescent protein to the biological clocks of the bacteria, synchronizing the clocks of the thousands of bacteria within a colony, then synchronizing thousands of the blinking bacterial colonies to glow on and off in unison.” These are referred to as biopixels. (Source: BLDGBLOG)
Architect Liam Young proposed the creation of bacterial billboards, squirrel-like living screens that would crawl through and inhabit the city (see below). They would nest in trees like LED ornaments and spring up whenever there’s news (or advertisements) to display.
(Source: BLDGBLOG)
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