Learn how to spin yarn using fiber from laboratory llamas, who produce antibodies for our vaccines, while exploring emerging narratives in the contemporary biomedical landscape. Join us in person on Thursday, March 24, at 7 pm, as Laura Splan will introduce her tactile sound installation Elevator Music 42: Laura Splan—Rhapsody for an Expanded Biotechnological Apparatus in the Tang’s elevator, and lead a discussion around scientific and conceptual themes in her work that examines hidden systems, invisible labor, and interspecies entanglements. Splan will lead a technical demonstration of spinning fiber on an electric wheel. Each participant will have an opportunity to try their hand at the wheel, and the first twenty participants will receive a small sample of laboratory llama yarn spun by the artist.

About the Artist

Laura Splan is a transdisciplinary artist working at the intersections of science, technology, and culture. Her research-driven, conceptually based art practice connects hidden artifacts of biotechnology to everyday lives through embodied interactions and sensory engagement using a wide range of media, including experimental materials, digital media, and craft processes. Her work has been exhibited around the world, including at the 2021 Bruges Triennial, BioBAT Art Space (Brooklyn), the New York Hall of Science, the David J. Spencer CDC Museum (Atlanta), the Museum of Contemporary Craft (Portland), the Museum of Arts and Design (New York), and the Beall Center for Art + Technology (Irvine). She has been supported by the Jerome Foundation, the Knight Foundation, the Institute for Electronic Arts at Alfred University, Harvestworks, and the Pollock-Krasner Foundation. Splan lives and works in Brooklyn, New York, in a building that has been both a pharmaceutical factory and a knitting factory.