Sunday, May 6 was the second in a three part conversation led by Proteus Anthropologist-In-Residence Eben Kirksey, examining what happens when natural and cultural worlds intermingle and collide. Eben is hosting the Multispecies Salon at Proteus Gowanus this spring, a “paraethnographic field site” where anthropologists, biologists, ecoartists and bioartists come together. The Multispecies Salon is a particularly concentrated instance of what Proteus Gowanus offers by serving as a site where the common interests of multiple disciplines can be explored through exhibitions and events that focus on a single theme over the course of a year.
As Eben says of the Multispecies Salon, “Art serve(s) as a companion and catalyst practice for thinking through and against nature-culture dichotomies.” His first conversation, April 29th, was a presentation and discussion of the Multispecies Salon, entitled ‘Gleanings from a Para-Site’. Yesterday’s conversation turned on the question of finding ‘Hope In Blasted Landscapes’. Next Sunday, May 13 5pm, Eben will lead a conversation on ‘Life in the Age of Biotechnology’.
