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IN THE SPRING OF 2002, I WAS ASKED TO LEAD A PUBLIC DISCUSSION ON "GENE(SIS)," AN EXHIBIT AT THE HENRY ART GALLERY IN SEATTLE THAT REVOLVED AROUND GENETIC RESEARCH—ITS DISCOVERIES, ITS POTENTIAL, ITS IMPLICATIONS. PREPARING FOR THE EVENT GOT ME THINKING ABOUT MY TEENAGE DAUGHTER AND THE CHOICES HER GENERATION MIGHT FACE. SOON AFTER, WHEN A RADIO INTERVIEWER ASKED ME WHAT MY NEXT PROJECT WOULD BE, I FOUND MYSELF SAYING I'D LIKE TO DEVELOP A PROJECT ON THE GENOME.
I often approach new areas of interest this way, as making dances gives me a platform on which to muse, to talk, to learn. It's a fabulous educational process.
During the development of Ferocious Beauty: Genome, I met with many wonderful scientists. At a lunch with science faculty at Wesleyan University, I asked them to think about how a performance piece might teach the public about the genome. Because they had to filter their remarks through a picture of what it means to present this knowledge theatrically, their answers were far different from their usual ones.
When the lunch was over, I thought to myself, "If nothing else happens with this project, at least we'll all go back to our laboratories newly energized. Both the artists and the scientists will be better off because we had this fresh thinking."
Photo: Paul Fetters
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