Harvesting the Net::MemoryFlesh, April 2001

Harvesting the Net::MemoryFlesh will be a para-formative tracing of the first year of the claimed completion of the Human Genome and the rise of genetic economies. The tracing process initiated by this harvesting will document, archive, and refold the routes of this new economy. The project will begin gathering net-based articles from April 06, 2000 when Celera Genomics announced its ‘completion' of the Human Genome, (a marketing date, not a scientific one). Research and documentation gathering will continue throughout the year and end on April 06, 2001.

This para-formative harvest will be a process of performing the system behavior of the networks and software of Genetic Economies and manifest itself in 5 steps. Harvesting the Net's end product will be a series of visualizations as mirrors of our ‘Memory Flesh' where eventually, all cells will be for sale.

The act of behaving in a purposefully reduced and analytically methodical manner is the result of immersion and successful upload of subjectivity when facing the behemoth master that is computer technology (the spine of the Internet). The act of performance allows a position to reconsider a chosen set of self-conscious, conceptual gestures in relation to this growing behemoth. Through this process I can translate a format of investigation and perform the system as it currently exists upsetting the master - slave relationship that is generated through technological distribution as we know it.

Step 1: Artist performs the system behavior. Tracing companies, research initiatives, mainstream media hype, and attempts to define the economic purpose of ourselves as Genome.

Step 2: Artist generates search strings and system behaviors which begin the harvest. This stage of system harvesting will be deposited into a database, the tissue of memoryflesh.

Step 3: Artist imposes a conceptual parsing engine that reflects the intersections between network architecture and genomic economies. Memoryflesh grafting continues.

Step 4: Artist reroutes developing archive of material collected and begins to formulate a database generator of genetic simulation, animating memoryflesh.

Step 5: Collaging and regenerating material mixed from the artist's performative searches, artist's generated auto-bot searches, and parsing engine outlines to create a series of visualizations that will parallel the process of building ourselves as Genome.