Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg | 5 mins | United Kingdom | 2011

E. chromi is a collaboration between designers and scientists in the new field of synthetic biology. In 2009, seven Cambridge University undergraduates spent the summer genetically engineering bacteria to secrete a variety of colored pigments, visible to the naked eye. They designed standardized sequences of DNA, known as BioBricks, and inserted them into escherichia coli (E. coli) bacteria.

SCREENING SCHEDULE
Controlled Experiment
8:00pm  Monday, October 17, 2011
The Bell House

PRODUCTION CREDITS
Director | Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg
Design | Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg, James King
Animation | Cath Elliot (Little Giant Pictures)
Illustration | Alice Hoult
Music | Matthew Irvine Brown

DIRECTOR BIO
Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg is an artist, designer and writer, integrating emerging technology and science with the function and future of design.

Through intensive research into synthetic biology, Daisy is exploring the role of design in a Biotech Revolution. Design Fellow on Synthetic Aesthetics, an NSF/EPSRC-funded project at Stanford University and the University of Edinburgh, she is curating an international programme researching the shared and shifting territory between synthetic biology, art and design.

Other works include The Synthetic Kingdom, a proposal for a new branch of the Tree of Life; E. chromi, a collaboration with James King and Cambridge University’s grandprize-winning team at the 2009 International Genetically Engineered Machine competition (iGEM) and a science fiction short story – The Well-Oiled Machine, cowritten with Oron Catts while resident at SymbioticA, the art and science collaborative laboratory at the University of Western Australia in 2009. Daisy taught both the ArtsScienceBangalore and Cambridge University iGEM teams in 2009. Most recently, Daisy designed ‘Synthesis’, a one-week, intensive synthetic biology lab workshop for artists, designers, scientists and others, in collaboration with The Arts Catalyst, UCL, SymbioticA, and Synthetic Aesthetics, funded by The Wellcome Trust.

Daisy studied Architecture at Cambridge University, design at Harvard University, and MA Design Interactions at the Royal College of Art. Her work has been exhibited at the Art Institute of Chicago, MoMA New York, The Wellcome Trust, The Design Museum London and the Ars Electronica Festival. Daisy lectures and publishes internationally.