Virus!
dal 16/1/2002 al 19/1/2002
Segnalato da
16/1/2002
Virus!
Bundeskunsthalle der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Bonn
Symposium. AIDS, Ebola and computer crashes; aliens, parasites and sleepers; bio- and cyber-terrorism - the image of the virus is ubiquitous. Since the beginning of the 1980s, when AIDS-fear inscribed itself onto the collective imagination, the virus has become one of the master metaphors of contemporary culture. The clandestine infiltration of a host organism, the subversive recoding of foreign operative systems, and the masqerades of mutation - virus maneuvres provide us with patterns on which to overlay a host of contact scenarios...
Symposium
AIDS, Ebola and computer crashes; aliens, parasites and
sleepers;
bio- and cyber-terrorism - the image of the virus is
ubiquitous.
Since the beginning of the 1980s, when AIDS-fear
inscribed itself
onto the collective imagination, the virus has become
one of the
master metaphors of contemporary culture.
The
clandestine
infiltration of a host organism, the subversive recoding
of foreign
operative systems, and the masqerades of mutation -
virus maneuvres
provide us with patterns on which to overlay a host of
contact
scenarios, even allowing for a reconceptualisation of
the
categories of 'self' and 'other'. Thus we find the
imagery of the
virus being implemented to authorise phobic measures of
containment
and exclusion - but simultaneously giving scope to
resistance and
modes of subversive self-fashioning. It should come as
no surprise
that current debates over terrorist violence also turn
out to be
entangled in these firmly entrenched patterns of
thought.
Viruses may be addressed as concrete objects or invoked
as
metaphors: they circulate throughout contemporary
discourse. The
"Virus!" symposium therefore invites immunologists,
historians of
medicine and technology, computer scientists, artists
and cultural
critics to address these issues.
The speakers will
investigate how
images of contagion, contact and contamination affect
the
production of scientific and technological 'hard facts',
and
reflect upon the role these images play in the formation
of a new
global order.
Concept:
Prof. Dr. Ruth Mayer
Dr. Brigitte Weingart
Dr. Bernd Busch
Conference language: German and English simultaneous translation
Museumsmeile Bonn
Friedrich-Ebert-Allee 4 53113 Bonn
Telefon (0228)9171-200 Fax (0228)9171-209