BLENDER is the first collaborative installation produced by Stelarc and Nina Sellars. Both artists undertook liposuction operations specifically for the purpose of this new work and have succeeded in securing the sanitised isolation and, most importantly, the legal ownership of the remnants of the procedures. The bio-materials are now housed within BLENDER's industrial casing, which was on exhibition at the Meat Market Gallery B in North Melbourne until August 18, 2005. The installation itself stands at just over 1.6 metres high and is anthropormorphic in scale and structure. Every few minutes BLENDER automatically circulates or "blends" its contents via a system of compressed air pumps and a pneumatic actuator. The mixture includes 4.6 litres of subcutaneous fat taken from Stelarc's torso and Nina Sellars' limbs, zylocain (local anaesthetic), adrenalin, O+ blood, sodium bicarbonate, peripheral nerves, saline solutions and connective tissue. Installed under a single, dramatic spotlight, BLENDER is also wired for sound. Rainer Linz's sound design subtly amplifies, distorts and delays the audio produced by the blending mechanism itself. The project is an inevitable outcome of Stelarc and Sellar's longstanding fascination with "alternative corporeal architectures" and bodily functions. It also, however, acts as an astute signpost toward some of the more contentious issues surrounding the blending of contemporary technology with corporeality. In an age in which the body is more frequently neither seen, nor heard, BLENDER is wryly anarchic: an audible, visceral display of "ontological" substance.   The world premiere of BLENDER was at the Meat Market Gallery B, 4-18 August 2005, 7 Blackwood Street, North Melbourne. Co-curated by Kristen Condon and Amelia Douglas and presented by TEKNIKUNST

3D Models - Adam Fiannaca
CONTENTS OF THE BLENDER INCLUDED SUBCUTANEOUS FAT FROM NINA'S LIMBS AND STELARC'S TORSO, SALINE SOLUTION, ZYLOCAIN (LOCAL ANAESTHETIC), ADRENALIN, O+ BLOOD, SODIUM BICARBONATE, PERIPHERAL NERVES & CONNECTIVE TISSUE. THE BODY TISSUE WAS AUTOCLAVED FOR STERILIZATION AND THE BLENDER VESSEL DISINFECTED AND HERMETICALLY SEALED. BOTH ARTISTS WERE BLOOD TESTED PRIOR TO THE SURGICAL PROCEDURES. THE BIO-MATERIAL WAS AERATED AND MIXED ONCE EVERY 5 MINUTES. AN AUTOMATED CHOREOGRAPHY OF BUBBLING AND BLENDING. COLLABORATING BY SUBTRACTING PHYSICALLY FROM EACH BODY. TECHNOLOGY AS A HOST FOR A LIQUID BODY.

BIOGRAPHIES

NINA SELLARS Nina Sellars' artistic practice combines drawing, photography, sculpture and new media and explores aspects of the physiology and phenomenology of the human body. Her figurative work has been exhibited in the Dobell Prize for Drawing at the Art Gallery of New South Wales and her recent interactive, computer animated installation titled 'Creation' was exhibited at the John Curtin Gallery as part of the 2005 Perth International Arts Festival. She has worked as a Prosector, dissector of human bodies for anatomical display, at the University of Western Australia and also as a Lecturer in drawing for the Costume and Design Department at the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts, Edith Cowan University. Sellars also designed with Stelarc "Corporeal Constructions", the course which they co-presented for the Centre of Ideas at the Victorian College of the Arts in Melbourne. In 2006 she received funding from the Australia Council to photograph Stelarc's "Extra Ear" surgery in Los Angeles.

RAINER LINZ A composer of electronic and instrumental music, Rainer Linz has worked with Stelarc since 1986 designing sound for many performances including the Amplified Body, Ping Body and Motion Prosthesis (Movatar). His most recent work includes the Fugue project, an interactive artificial immune system and the computer/text performance Banalities for the Perfect House. Additional information can be found on the website http://www.rainerlinz.net/

ADAM FIANNACA Adam Fiannaca has aided the artistic production of works in a sometimes creative and sometimes technical position for many artists such as Adam Zaretsky, TC & A group, Cynthia Verspaget, Stelarc and Nina Sellars. Fiannaca's technical abilities and his own creative projects bridge the divide between technologist and artist, highlighting a "new breed" of artistic negotiation. His skills rate highly amongst industry professionals and are creatively embodied in the artistic works he collaborates on.

THANKS ALSO TO LINSEY HAGEN, CAMERON JONES AND LEON VERSPAGET

 

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