Winners
BAD Award 2015

Three winning projects, each worth 25.000 euros, have been selected as winners of the Bio Art & Design Award 2015 by an international jury on Friday May 22nd, 2015. A Dutch bioscientist was involved in the execution of each individual BAD Award winning project. The international jury, chairman William Myers (US), Ian Brunswick (Science Gallery Dublin, Ireland), Karen Verschooren (STUK, Belgium) en Laurens Landeweerd (Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen-ISIS/ TUDelft-BTS, Netherlands) chose these winners from ten teams of collaborating international artists/designers and scientists from Dutch researchinstitutions.

From November 27th onwards the accomplished artworks by the winners were on show at MU artspace in Eindhoven, the Netherlands. Winners of the BAD Award 2015 – artists and scientists – have illustrated their projects during the science-meets-press event called Bessensap on June 12th. There will also be work of previous on show.

The winning project are:

The MSA: Microbiome Security Agency

Artist: Emma Dorothy Conley (Ierland)
Scientist: Dr. Guus Roeselers (Microbiologie & Systeembiologie, TNO)

The Microbiome Security Agency (The MSA) investigates the future of microbiome privacy issues and prepares citizens for a future where our personal information is at risk through our biological datasets. Your microbiome is a unique composition of bacteria, functioning as a record that reveals information about the people and places you’ve encountered. But how is this information protected? Empowering individuals to secure their own data, The MSA provides the public with a toolkit of DIY biological information manipulation tactics.

Drones with desires

Artist: Agi Haines (Verenigd Koninkrijk)

Scientist: Dr. Marcel de Jeu & Dr. Jos van der Geest (Neurowetenschappen, Erasmus MC)

The focus of ‘Drones with desires’ is to breathe life into mechanical devices through altering their material substance. With an increased efficiency of modelling the brain for artificialintelligence or the introduction of mechanics within biomedical sciences, where are theboundaries of human-ness in a world full of integrated and invasive technologies? How mightwe respond to a machine that characterizes human behaviors through a reconstructed sensory nervous system? This project will explore the thin line between natural and artifice, by creating a machine with inbuilt human memories.

The Art of Deception

Artist: Isaac Monté (Sri Lanka)

Scientist Prof. Toby Kiers (Department of Ecological Science, VU)

Humans use deception to achieve perfection in society, art and science. Reacting to this through art, we take discarded pig hearts and transform them into elegant vessels for new life by decellularizing them and re-populating them with various techniques, into new fully functional and aesthetically improved hearts for humans. We aim to explore how biological interventions and aesthetic manipulation can be used as tools for the ultimate deception: the transformation of inner beauty, from grotesque to perfect.

About the award

The BAD Award (called Designers & Artists 4 Genomics Award till 2013) is a unique competition that aims at stimulating young artists and designers from The Netherlands and abroad to experiment with bioart and design and to collaborate with renowned Dutch science centers.

The Award aims to

• Stimulate interest, excitement and debate about the Life Sciences through high-quality, original artistic practice;
• Examine the social, cultural and ethical contexts of the Life Sciences through the arts;
• Promote high-quality interdisciplinary practice and collaborations between art/ design and science/technology.

The Awards of €25.000,- each are assigned by an international jury to the most promising and original proposals in the competition. The projects are consequently realised within six months and exhibited. Some contestants who do not get an Award still find other ways to realize their ideas.

For more information see the BAD Awards website.