Kathleen Rogers
Saturday May 19, 3pm ­ 4pm
Surrey Institute of Art and Design, UK

The Imagination of Matter

This paper is based on a series of artworks and field research in the maize growing community of Chiapas, Mexico, conversations with senior maize specialists with a broad knowledge of the scientific, social and anthropological aspects of maize and visits to the classic Mayan site of Palenque. My aim is to present an integretive model of human consciousness based on cross- disciplinary comparisons of the symbolism of maize in genetic science, ancient Mayan mythology and art, and contemporary Mayan maize cultivation rituals.

Art and the Visualisation of DNA in Pre-historic Maize

Maize mythology is full of anthropomorphic and biological imagery and the metaphorical explanations often reveal empirically verifiable facts. Myths surrounding its genesis (its DNA) are an example - an ancient high technology and the basis of an entire culture. Through DNA profiling it may be possible to find in the residue of maize matter an informational field with structural resonance's that echo its origins in pre-history.

The scientific procedure from pre-historic maize involves irreversible destructive analysis. Several ancient maize specimens were identified in the Museum of Archaeology in Cambridge and with the help of Robin Boast and Martin Jones at the museum it was arranged that the analysis of a sample of pre-historic maize from El Reigo caves in Puebla, Mexico could be carried out at the department of Biomolecular Sciences, University of Manchester under the supervision of Fabio de Oliveira Freitas (a microbiologist making DNA comparisons between ancient and modern maize in Brazil). 

The complete DNA code for maize has been unravelled but it's prehistoric cultivation remains a mystery. The process of separating and identifying the DNA is slow, precise, technologically demanding, volatile and not guaranteed success. Working on an invisible level it involves many subtle stages, each of which effects the isolation of the DNA.

In sterile laboratory conditions the sample of maize is ground to dust in a pestle and mortar. A liquid buffer is added and the resulting mix is separated using centrifugal force. The resulting substance is incubated, spun again made into a pellet, re-suspended and turned into a gel. The aim is to optimise the reactions through the control of time, temperature and molecular chemistry in order to use the extraordinary attributes of the DNA itself to manifest. Using enzymes of different concentrations the nucleotides are tagged and again exposed to heat, cold, drying and centrifuge. Using electrolysis the ions are drawn from one side of the gel to the other and visualised using ultra-violet light. This repeated spinning, pressure, dilution, erosion, absorption and rejection results in a separation of identifiable DNA sequence of 300 base pairs. But it is never predictable.

The methodologies of art offer a similar and emotive synthesis while making visible a different level of information that is more difficult to quantify or analyse. 

The key metaphors, thoughts and ideas used as a response to the destructive methodology and in creating the final artwork focussed on the following themes.

The residue of dust following the destructive analysis as the carrier of an informational field with structural resonance that echoes it origins in pre-history.

The existence of altered states in human consciousness that can give access to the informational fields of DNA on a molecular level.

DNA as an ultimate ancient high technology.

Evidence of maize in ethnography as an alive, conscious and responsive entity. 

The genetic flexibility of maize and its sexual transmutation by domestication. 

Maize cultivation as interactive, bio-socio technology. 

The cultivation of maize as the basis of a cultural technology for integrating human and plant consciousness. 

The spiralling and twisting alphabetical language of DNA and the narrative structure of the Mayan, Popol Vuh Images of DNA in accounts of the origins of maize in Mayan mythology. 

Links between DNA photon emissions and the idea of a global network of conscious DNA. 

The periodic crystal of water at the heart of DNA and the structure and phenomena of the spinning hydrogen molecule. 

Human characteristics of maize in Mayan, pre-Columbian iconography. 

Credits: Fabio de Oliveira (University of Brazil) and Terry Brown of the department of Biomolecular Science University of Science and Technology, Manchester UK. Robin Boast and Martin Jones at The Museum of Anthropology and Archaeology at The University of Cambridge, UK

This work was commissioned by the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation for an international art and science exhibition at Kettles Yard Gallery and the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology at Cambridge University. 

Biography

Kathleen Rogers is a Research Fellow in Image Manipulation and Digital Culture at the Surrey Institute of Art and Design. Previously Course Director of the post graduate school of Television and Imaging at Dundee University. For the past decade, Kathleen Rogers has developed a textual framework and multi-media artworks that reflect her interest in interdisciplinary discourses and cross-cultural consciousness research. She has presented work at many international festivals of video and electronic art. Most recently at The Lab as part of the Gateway Project in San Francisco and as part of the international art and science exhibition, Noise at Kettles Yard in London and Cambridge.