On the occasion of the publication of the Coded Cultures book, we decided to publish the full dialogue between Verina Gfader and us.

Go on, read it in it’s entire glory. You know you want to.

50 plus 3 questions for BCL aka The BCL meets … Nullnummer

50 plus 3 questions for BCL is a dialogue between BCL and Verina Gfader conducted via a shared online document in June 2010. Discussing the underlying codes and strategies of the work Common Flowers / Flower Commons, 2008-, the dialogue forms the base for the essay Imaginary Agents — Flowers and the Common (in Russegger, G., Tarasiewicz, M. and Wlodkowski, M. (eds) Coded Cultures. New Creative Practices out of Diversity. Springer Wien/New York Edition Angewandte 2011). As a parallel investigation to the theoretical elaboration, this more informal exchange of thoughts pushes the artists’ ideas further into an improvised process of gathering data about their activities and everyday. Subjects of 50 plus 3 questions for BCL include issues of bio-hacking, the common, DIY flowers, tactical practices, societal plants, instructions for actions and Tokyo sites.

And that’s what Amazon has to say about the book:

International Authors from Europe and Asia explain the impact of codes and cultures on society

Through the establishment of new creative cultures, enabled by digital media and global communication networks, new practices and ability profiles of artistic delineations and explorations are gaining new grounds. Furthermore, economic models are eager to create synergies with symbolic values of cultural and artistic programs to deal with the potentials of »creativity«. At the present day it is difficult to predict which catalysts and draft programs can be put into effect for these creative innovation processes. In this book a detailed review from international artists, theorists, researchers and curators will be given on new vectors of creative and artistic coded and cultures departed from digital media related art projects and observation models on the intersection of disciplines like Art, Science, Technology and Design.

We finally managed to put the first interview of the BCL meets … online. BCL meets … is (or will be) a series of interviews with artists, scientists, designers, theoreticians and other practitioners working in the field of Art & Biology.
Our first interview partners (many thanks for being our test pilot) was Allison Kudla, who we met during the ‘Alter Nature’ exhibtion at Z33 last November. (Note to oneself. Faster turn-around times!). If everything goes to plan, our next interviewees will be Tony Dunne & Fiona Raby in February and Joe Davis in March. Allison set the bar quite high already, I hope our next interviews will be as nice as this one.

To watch the interview and hear Allison talk about herself, her background and her works head over to our inagural interview. Without further ado: BCL meets Allison Kudla.