CRISPR Artist Residency

What does CRISPR have to do with art? What does art have to say about CRISPR?

The IGI, together with Stochastic Labs, created a unique artist residency program to explore these questions. Based in Berkeley, Stochastic Labs convenes the best creative minds in the Bay Area and beyond for conversations about the future of technology, science, entrepreneurship, and the arts.

The CRISPR (un)commons residency invited artists to explore CRISPR applications and envision new ways of engaging with the future of genome editing. Through art, we can find new ways to talk, think about, and explore scientific concepts and ethical and social questions.

In the CRISPR (un)commons program, a small group of artists lived in community together at the Stochastic Labs house in North Berkeley for two months. During this time, they are invited into the IGI to engage directly with our researchers and CRISPR technology. Ultimately, they produce creative works that reflect on this innovative system.

Stay tuned for news on the next residency. While the program is currently on hold, we hope to bring the program back soon.

2019 CRISPR Artists

2019 CRISPR Art Projects

The art projects that resulted from the 2019 CRISPR (un)commons Artist Residency at the IGI ranged from an audio exploration of informed consent to intricate tapestries to an ancient art of paper making combined with modern genome editing technology. Watch the video below to learn more about the "CRISPaper" project, and read more about the projects in our article, Visualizing CRISPR through Art.