EXHIBIT ANNOUNCEMENT: MEME BREEDERS

Cultivating New Forms of Life in the Media

Public Enemy
Negativland
Natasha Vita More
Dan McGuire
The Riot Grrrls
Mindflux
GH Hovagimyan
Mark Pawson
Lloyd Dunn

Curated by Ebon Fisher

Opening Thursday October 10, 1996, 2-5pm
THE AKUS GALLERY
Eastern Connecticut State University
83 Windham Street
Willimantic, CT, 06226-2295
(806) 465-4647

MEME BREEDERS attempts to extract a few nerves from a living culture and
hang them together in a room. The nerves themselves are an assortment of
posters, fanzines, albums, and other communication devices produced by a
new generation of cultural activists. Their efforts go far beyond the
making of pretty objects, extending into the media, and into the minds
and onto the bodies of the public. This practice is a kind of media
dance. If the dance is successful, the creators' images and words will
begin to replicate in society's webs of communication.

In light of recent ecological theories of culture, these artists may be
some of the first to consciously manipulate the media and the public in
order to "breed" their creations. Although it may not be the language
shared by all the artists in the show, the replicating entities
represented here are what "cultural biologists" are beginning to call
"memes," or primitive media organisms.

WIGGLE REPLACES ART

20th Century art theories of the Western world have usually bound
culture to the large-brained, bipedal creatures who manufactured it.
Surrealism explored the realm of the human unconscious. Expressionism
passionately attempted to release the human psyche into form. Pop art
and minimalism flirted with serial processes of corporate mass
production.

[…]

Many of these cultural theories have included attempts to transcend the
human, but their effect in practice has been to reinforce a mainstream
HUMANIST subplot running along the spine of history.

Exit art, enter ecology. With the recent emergence of ecological
theories of culture and technology, the human dream may be fragmenting
and mutating into a multitude of very different creatures. Culture may
not be a simple collection of songs and sculptures, but may grow in our
minds like a host of alien species. From an objective standpoint this
poses a challenge to our humanist tradition. Subjectively, it is
delightfully obscene. A form of "hyperzoology" may be emerging.
Collectively shared media organisms replace the art object as the focus
of aesthetic attention. That which seems to "wiggle" becomes a new
definition of beauty.

MEMES

The evolutionary biologist, Richard Dawkins, coined the term "meme" in
1976, to launch a theory of culture which built upon the enduring
successes of Darwin's theory of evolution. A meme, according to Dawkins,
is a "unit of cultural transmission."[Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene,
1976, p. 192] It's a little memory nugget analogous to a gene. It
replicates, not in the strict genetic sense, but more loosely within the
mental environment of our species. In other words, a meme contains a
"code" which replicates in the minds of humans, alters behavior, which
further aids in the propagation of the meme. Media, from gossip to
literature to satellites, is the fertile field that sustains these new
lifeforms.

[…]

THE MEME AS A NEW METAPHOR

But before we join the memetic feeding frenzy, I suggest we reactivate
Public Enemy's immunity meme, "Don't Believe the Hype," to create some
critical distance. In one sense intellectual history can be seen as a
series of ever-changing metaphors. The current meme metaphor intrigues
me, not for its accuracy, but its ability to foster a deeper
appreciation for a more organic kind of cultural production. It allows
us to replace the word "production" with the post-industrial word
"cultivation" or perhaps "breeding." A warmer, more flexible, more
decentralized, and more interactive culture is implied.

[…]

MEME BREEDERS explores a number of artists whose work has penetrated the
media and the collective imagination. What's important in this exhibit
is not the actual t-shirts and posters which are on display, but the way
they have induced waves of responses in the public mind. These works
aren't always perfectly crafted gestures, but then again, something
which ultimately lives in the mind cannot be crafted. It creeps around
like a weed.