What does protocol look like when the laboratories of the future are no longer contained within sanitized architectural spaces, but are growing out in the wild landscape? Whether it’s synthetic biology experiments or geoengineering climate practices, the boundary between the lab and landscape is dissolving. We are bringing experimental studies back into the wild, and we have to.
Using a mix of Unreal Engine and (limited use of) AI, I want to make a short non-linear animation about feral protocols for science.
Objects and beings it’d feature: 3d printed bio-mechanical insects, worm-like scientific glassware, decellularized hearts planter, etc. Some related artwork I made in the past, both virtual and physical:
Inspired by scientist Michael Levin’s research on xenobots, Micronaut Odyssey imagines a future of microbial robots wandering in space.
As completely biological robots made from living cells, Xenobots can perform specific tasks without being genetically edited. In the future, they could help repair human tissues, remove pollutants, generate human organs, and capture carbon dioxide. Xenobots being deployed for space missions might be an ultimate form of feral protocols. They roam in the vast, largely unknown cosmos, sensing, decoding, transmitting information.
Science fiction art usually uses hard surface models to kitbash large industriral infrastructures or space fleets. Micronaut Odyssey imagines a different kind of sci-fi aesthetic that centers the soft, the living, the microscale high-tech futures.
In this non-narrative animation, speculative xenobots with different shapes and movements wander in space, against the backdrop of Martian terrains under a microscopic lens. With Schubert’s Ave Maria playing in the background, the camera slowly follows these robots on their odyssey.
