Week 4 - MedTech + Art

 

    This week's lecture videos were very interesting and eye-opening to me. To see the true fascination with the human body and to seek out knowledge about how things worked amazed me. Professor Vesna discussed some very interesting topics regarding the bridge between humans and technology using the medical world. As stated in the Part 4 lecture, our society has been connecting humans to technology for far longer than I had realized. Learning about Kevin Warwick and how he implanted a chip into his arm for the ability to control technology through his brain signals is fascinating and incredible. 

    This connection opens up a question regarding the future of prosthetics for people across the world. When will people be able to use prosthetics fully connected to their brains with more additional features? Art design has already allowed prosthetics to look more human-like but when will technology increase the abilities of these prosthetics? We have the power to make changes and I can ultimately see us leading to a world similar to the movie "Robocop" 

    The movie is a beautiful bridge between medical technology and art due to the body given to the cop, Murphy, following his accident. The art used on his body helps represent the human form to make people feel more comfortable but also allows the function to be a cop. The movie does an amazing job at connecting these two ideas that were foreign to me before the lectures. I previously looked at medicine and art as two separate entities but now I understand the roles they play in the existence of the other. For medicine to work the way it should, art must be used to create prosthetics or to save lives. While at the same time, when making art, the world of medicine can be a medium of choice in how representation works, and this week's lectures showed how deep the connection between art and medicine can be.

Works Cited:

1. Newsroom. “The Future Belongs to Cyborgs. the Scientist Who Connects the Brain with Ai Comes to Imworld 2019.” Business Review, Business Review, 13 Sept. 2018, https://business-review.eu/news/the-future-belongs-to-cyborgs-the-scientist-who-connects-the-brain-with-ai-comes-to-imworld-184268.

2. Phillips, Patrick. “This Is What Peter Weller Has Been up to since RoboCop - Looper.” Looper.com, Looper, 4 May 2021, https://www.looper.com/400982/this-is-what-peter-weller-has-been-up-to-since-robocop/.

3. Robocop Movie Trailer (1987) - Youtube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3mLmHUbC240.

4. (www.dw.com), Deutsche Welle. “The Weird Metamorphosis of Kevin Warwick, World's First Cyborg: DW: 28.03.2002.” DW.COM, https://www.dw.com/en/the-weird-metamorphosis-of-kevin-warwick-worlds-first-cyborg/a-484607. 

5. Vesna, Victoria. Lecture 4. CoLE DESMA 9. Web. 

6. H, Philippa. “Top Advancements in Prosthetics in 2020.” Fish Insurance, 30 Dec. 2019, https://www.fishinsurance.co.uk/top-advancements-in-prosthetics-in-2020/.