diemut

SUGABABE at the Chinese Biennale 2024

SUGABABE

2014 – 2021

Living genetically engineered, reprogrammed and immortalized chondrocytes, seeded on biodegradable scaffold, maintained in glass containers infused with plasma using an IV pump system.

Pedestal equipped with a computer system, microphone, amplifier and speakers.

Installation View SUGABABE / Display of 2024 at Ennova Art Museum #2

Sugababe is a living replica of Vincent van Gogh‘s left ear, created in collaboration with a team of scientists from several institutions including MIT, Harvard and CURML.

In Sugababe, the Theseus paradox—a thought experiment based on Plutarch’s Ship of Theseus, which questions whether an object that has all its component parts replaced remains the same object – has been applied to the molecular level by replacing various natural components with engineered ones: We replaced natural DNA present in a living cell line from a van Gogh male descendant with foreign DNA of a living female descendant and natural DNA with modified variations, namely those genes and other components that are supposed to influence and enhance artistic creativity.

The involved technology such as gene scissors CRISPR Cas9 and mRNA technology is probing the re- creation of a historical person and options to enhance our natural physical dispositions. The principles of such technologies allow us to alter, control and re-design our own “hardware.”

SUGABABE

View #3

View of Sugababe at Tsinghua University, Beijing in 2024 in the Lab of Ouyang Liliang. Display handled by Chuqian Wang and Xuening Zhang.

SUGABABE

View #4

SUGABABE / 2014-2021
Living genetically engineered, reprogrammed and immortalized chondrocytes, seeded on biodegradable scaffold, maintained in glass containers infused with plasma using a pump system.

View #5

During the opening at Ennova Art Museum, Chinese Biennale, 2024

View #6

SUGABABE at Ennova Art Museum, Chinese Biennale, 2024

View #7

Van Gogh’s missing ear is nothing less than the key story, the very essence of the romantic myth of art and artist, the still tremendously vivid idea of the artist as a genius. Sugababe could be seen as a recreation of the common myth, formally and conceptually attached to the iconic story as its dialectic opposite.

View #8

View #9

View #10

View #11

View #12

View of Ennova Art Museum #1

View of Ennova Art Museum #2

View of Ennova Art Museum #3

During the opening at ZKM Karlsruhe, Germany in May 2014

Noam Chomsky was the first person to speak to the ear.

To the left is Lieuwe van Gogh.

Noam Chomsky speaks to Sugababe

PDF entire project with scientific description

BBC video

The Show at the Chinese Biennale in the Ennova Art Museum from September 2024 – June 2025 was made possible through he extraordinary dedication and support of Ouyang Liliang’s Lab at Tsinghua University in Beijing. The PhD and Master Students Chuqian Wang, Xuening Zhang, Yiyue Hong, Dezhi Zhou improved the technical setup and the bioreactor, system designed originally by Charles Vacanti, to full perfection and run an equally perfect show for 6 month.Website: https://llouyang.com/

Sugababe was executed in collaboration with the following scientists:

Robert Langer, MIT, Yulia Rybakova, Jason (Yen-Chun) Lu and Luke Hyunsik Rhym, Alice Stanton, all MIT, Mary B Goldring, Hospital for Special Surgery and Weill Cornell Medical College,
Charles Vacanti, Harvard, Ian Wilmut, MRC Edinburgh,
Vincent Castella/Christian Gehrig, University Center of LegalMedicine, Lausanne-Geneva, George Church, Harvard, Tessa Hadlock, Fouzi Benboujja, both Mass Eye and Ear Institute, Peter Cariani, Boston University, Bertrand Delgutte, Harvard, Mass Eye and Ear Institute,

Farshid Guilak, Washington University Center of Regenerative Medicine.

Marcy Zenobi Wang, ETH Zurich