Clothes that Grow from Living Human Tissue
Thu, Oct 30, 2008
Environmental Graffiti Will be Changing Dramatically Soon. Get a Sneak Preview By Signing Up Here.
All images: Tissue Culture and Art Project
In a lab far, far away grows a tiny coat, made of living tissue and shaped into what looks like small winter-wear for a mouse. The oddity of it is, this coat is alive, or was, (it has since died) a living organism created in a lab for the sake of art. Known as Victimless Leather, this project was grown onto a polymer matrix, coated with immortalized living cells, and shaped into a stitch-less form to create a coat like shape.
The implications of such a project are limitless, but the purpose of the scientific team is to stimulate conversation, debate and discussion on the possibility of wearing ‘leather’ without killing living animals.
The School of Anatomy and Human Biology at the University of Western Australia and a team of scientists, Oran Catts, Ionat Zurr and Guy Ben-Ary, developed the project as an “art form to illuminate our human conduct with other living systems.
“… by de-constructing our cultural meaning of clothes as a second skin through art, we raise questions about our exploitation of other living beings.”
How society views this project and the effects of creating ‘beings’ for art, or otherwise, remains to be seen. Some may call it art, some say it’s horrendous yet some will call it science. In any context, it is still thought-provoking.
Other Tissue Projects:
• The Disembodied Cuisine: attempting to grow sheep or frog skeletal muscle over bio-polymer for food
• The Flying Pig: attempting to grow wings on a pig
• The Extra Ear 1/4 Scale: attempting to show recognizable living body parts as an art form
• The Living Doll: attempting to make partially living worry dolls
If you want to find out all the latest news on the environment, why not subscribe to our RSS feed? We’ll even throw in a free album.
You Might Also Like Our Friends' Posts From the Intertubes
“The only true currency in this bankrupt world is what you share with someone else.”
1 Trackbacks For This Post
-
the nutshell paragraph » Blog Archive » Seventy-two hours to the Moment of Decision Says:
November 19th, 2008 at 8:23 am[...] Leather without the animal A biology school in Australia is growing “Victimless Leather” in a lab — living tissue that was never a living animal’s skin… [...]
October 31st, 2008 at 4:58 am
What does one say? I am appalled that it was done for art’s sake, but, why? Hadn’t it been, I wouldn’t be aware. I am repulsed until I consider all of the animals that die for my shoes, belts, meals, whathaveyou… There is something very dangerous in this, but science is dangerous, and I should be more open minded. Thanks. I shall think about this.
October 31st, 2008 at 2:08 pm
How much is the coat in the window?
A question almost as repulsive as the coat in the window.
October 31st, 2008 at 2:28 pm
That first comment was brutal. Don’t write out your thought processes, Adam H Klein. Think first, then comment.
November 2nd, 2008 at 9:15 am
I dont think that it will ever be on the market (maybe on ebay)
cause live tissue makes fluids and you just dont want to ware it when it has some body fluids on it. This project is more like a messege to killing animals.
personally i think thats repulsive and the creator should play SPORE and every thing will be much clearer to him.
November 2nd, 2008 at 11:47 pm
Creating ‘beings’? It’s a cell-tissue culture, no more a ‘being’ than your blood donation is. I have no issue with people finding it distasteful, by any means, however taste is a subjective quality. Some find raising an animal from birth and then killing it for fashion to be distasteful.
The issue is obviously a contentious one that requires fair and open discussion. Yet throwing in a mix of misinformation and hyperbole is the fastest way to unbalance any discourse on the matter.
November 3rd, 2008 at 12:47 am
Keep at it and when you get a complete working human heart, call me I need one desperately Thank You for your interesting pursuits, and Thank God for your lives. The more you find out the better off all of mankind! This is an area that needs lots of funding. Maybe one day you will grow a “coat” for a burn victim! Trying for artificial fingers, ears and other appendages might prove interesting too! Meanwhile, about a set of seamless seats for my Porsche?
November 3rd, 2008 at 9:09 pm
hmmmmmm nasty!!! Likw i really want to walk around with shirt made out of earlobes. “Can you hear me now?”
November 12th, 2008 at 1:36 am
I think I’m going to be sick, can someone make that into a hat for me?
August 20th, 2009 at 8:36 pm
LOL.. Looks like something Buffalo Bill http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x81F28kPXuo would have concocted.
Totally lame as art. Again shows that science and art are mutually exclusive in a general sense. Stick to your usual lab work, my boys.
Hah!
September 1st, 2009 at 12:51 pm
can you eat it?