“Better”

Promising a better future, architects, designers, engineers, marketers, politicians, and scientists often invoke the imaginary of “better", constructing dreams with material effects. But better is not a universal good or a verified measure: it is imbued with politics and values. And better won't be delivered equally, if at all. What is better? Whose better? Who gets to decide? Over the last decade, Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg has worked with the visionaries of synthetic biology, a new approach to genetic engineering. She will discuss her experimentation with critical design practices to question “better” and create possibility for alternative dreams.

Dr. Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg is an artist, designer, and writer. Her experimental practice explores values shaping design, science, and technology through the design of objects and fictions, writing and curating. Daisy is lead author of “Synthetic Aesthetics: Investigating Synthetic Biology’s Designs on Nature” (MIT Press, 2014) and in 2017 finished “Better”, her PhD in Design Interactions at the Royal College of Art. Daisy received the World Technology Award for Design in 2011, and the London Design Medal for Emerging Talent in 2012. Her work has been exhibited at institutions worldwide including MoMA New York, London’s Design Museum, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Israel Museum, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, and the National Museum of China, and it appears in museum and private collections.

Image: “Rewilding with Synthetic Biology” from “Designing for the Sixth Extinction” 2013-15 by Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg.