Robotic, Augmented and Cyborg Plants is an M.F.A. Thesis Exhibition taking critical theory in the area of human-machine-interface, agricultural science, and cyborgs and explores the philosophical and ethical considerations[1] of allowing plants to utilize technology for their own means. Furthermore, these “plants” will be networked, aesthetically playing homage to the fungi networks of communication in the plant world[2], with a web based portal, allowing for human-machine/human-machine-plant interaction. These post-natural plants and robotic counterparts will be hosted in an architecturally sculpted immersive environment which aesthetically looks like futurist theme of plant-machine symbiosis.
[1] Willemsen, A. “The dignitiy of living beings with regard to plants: moral consideration of plants for their own sake.” 2008 : 23. Print.
[2] Song, Yuan Yuan, Res Sen Zeng, Jian Feng Xu, Jun Li, Xiang Shen, and Woldemariam Gebrehiwot Yihdego. “Interplant Communication of Tomato Plants through Underground Common Mycorrhizal Networks.” PLoS ONE : Accelerating the Publication of Peer-reviewed Science. Web. 13 Feb. 2011.
This project is supported by the Pennsylvania State University Institute for the Arts and Humanities 2011 Graduate Student Summer Residency.
PSU Graduate Exhibition Poster
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