| Individually, these works imply seemingly disparate aspects of humanity or anthropology. The fully pregnant stomach epitomizes health, success, and hope. The brain echoes science and the deeper inner workings, or ghost in the machine, of a person. The apparent synthesis of the two works is the text. In Latin, ‘natura non facit saltum,’ translates; ‘nature makes no leaps.’
Thus, it is as well, in nature, through the evolution of all specie’s brains and the inherent purpose in nature of replication, or reproduction, that these symbols explore our human place within that of all species and those shared commonalities. Through this purpose of nature, or life, the replication of the brain and the persistent drive to again replicate new amalgamations, is present in everyone. To replicate is an instinct within our genes, to them as to us, it means the future of life. Nature makes no leaps.
Even within the awe inspiring distinction of the capabilities of the human brain, that distinction has also evolved with an equally profound break in the function of replication as understood in evolution. The field of ‘memetics,’ (as in genetics) represents the mental equivalent of genetic replication. Therefore, just as genes replicate themselves, as do memes. The content of the meme is an idea. Ideas such as superstitions, slogans, policies, and basic belief systems are examples. Again, like genes, some are fit or healthy to survive and reproduce, others simply dwindle into what may be compared to extinction. Furthermore, within evolutionary contexts, the brain as an evolved organ, just as the heart, liver and all the reproductive organs, is a shared organ among all the planet’s so equipped species. Therefore, as with ‘them’ as with humans, the evolution of the brain and its concerns are shared. Not simply in terms of securing resources, mates, territory, and the like, but fundamentally in action and behavior. This field of science was once called ‘sociobiology,’ but is now referred to as ‘evolutionary psychology.’
The two works of art “Reproduction” and “Time, Communication, Artifact,” I believe, may be better understood through this brief analysis. “Reproduction,” is represented with the ‘mold’ that was made to create the pregnant torso. In effect this mold is now rendered useless for further reproductions of this torso. However, the idea of reproducing, both as the purpose of the mold and through the pregnant stomach, is now fixed. “Time, Communication, Artifact,” represents another mold-based bronze casting of the human brain. Furthermore, the material of the plaque is significant in this presentation. Within the greater context of both works, the process and time scale of evolution is deeply profound. The brain is mounted onto a piece of Indiana Limestone. This limestone, as being a sedimentary stone, is an exact detail of 350 million years of time (life, reproduction and death) and the fossilized remains of silicon based life forms from that ancient sea bottom. In turn, the connotation of the brain and the body are given their greater context as well.
Finally, natura non facit saltum, a pre-Darwinian Latin term for evolution, functions as an usher into the individual yet common identities of these works, but more importantly into what they may offer for our own identities, individual yet common. |
