Pei-Ying Lin (TW), Špela Petrič (SI), Dimitrios Stamatis (GR), Jasmina Weiss (SI): PSX Consultancy
Interdisciplinary research project, 2015
The PSX Consultancy project conceives augmentations intended for vegetal species for purposes of enhancing the given client’s natural reproductive processes. In other words, we make sex toys for plants.
Misleadingly quirky, the PSX Consultancy is a project investigating the changing paradigm of the human/non-human relationship. Incorporating cultural frameworks through which we as humans understand ourselves and our environment - science, design and art - we improvise design tools that challenge our anthropocentric vantage point to think on the plants’ behalf. The concepts produced by the interdisciplinary team of designers, artists and scientists are science-based, design-driven, irony-infused, and playfully-delivered.
As the plant clients are silent about their necessities, we relied on scientific knowledge of plant biology as well as design methodologies in the pursuit of thought-provoking, intelligible augmentations. What happens when artistic motivation appropriates human-centered design for use on plant clients?
The result of the interdisciplinary approach are critical discursive objects posing as sex toys, inherently paradoxical and absurd, yet manifesting our “all means possible” attempt to truly understand the non-human. Through the hybrid exploration of the parallelism between plant and human reproductive strategies, we uncover the realm of bio-logic whilst provoking the ethical discourse connected to post-anthropocentrism. The motivation, client biology/requirements and bio-logic of the particular "sex toys" is explained in the booklet attached.
The installation of 3D printed proposals alongside the plant clients is only one of the outcomes of this process-based project. Equally important is the hands-on engagement of the public in the form of workshops and discussions across different cultural traditions, leading to an ever expanding collection of plants and their sex toys whilst inviting the audience to explore the non-human experiences in their mind.
Credits:
A collaborative project developed within the "Designing Life" topic at BIO50, the Biennial of Industrial Design 2014, Ljubljana, Slovenia; supported by MAO, the Museum of Architecture and Design, Ljubljana; the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Slovenia; the Ministry of Culture, Taiwan, R. O. C.; National Culture and Arts Foundation, Taiwan, R. O. C.
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Project's web page: psx-consultancy.com
Pei-Ying Lin (TW) (1986) is an artist, designer and programmer with an MA in Design Interactions, Royal College of Art and BSc Life Science, minor in Computer Science and Cultural Studies in National Tsing Hua University, Taiwan. Her main focus is on the combination of science and human society, through artistic methods. She currently is running a Taiwanese BioArt community in Taiwan.
Špela Petrič (SI) (1980), BSc, MA started her professional career as a scientific researcher in the field of biochemistry. Her interest in the context of knowledge production and its cultural impact motivated her to obtain a degree in Transmedia at LUCA, Brussels. She has been working with living systems as an artist-researcher since 2011. Her artistic practice combines natural sciences, new media and performance.
Dimitrios Stamatis (GR) (1983) is a designer with a formal background in Product / Graphic design. He has worked in Athens, London and Hangzhou designing products for a range of diverse industries. Currently he is operating as a freelancer (leavenlab.com) exploring how design can contribute as a catalyst for positive change.
Jasmina Weiss (SI) (1963) is interior designer and designer with formal background with MA in Architecture / Design. She works in different fields (like culture, fashion, science - philosophy, psychology, biology, ecology,... ) which are connected with design, architecture and art.
