Event One - Hammer - This is the End

The first event I attended was Ed Atkins movie feature “Even Pricks” in the collection “This is the End.” While the exhibit featured a number of interesting visuals, the one I found most interesting was his depiction of a talking chimp.

Talking Chimp from "Even Pricks" - Source Hammer

The chip appears several times, speaking enigmatic phrases, most centering on a kind of connection between the chimp and his addressed. This is reminiscent of the discussion of biotech an art, where we asked “what is intelligence?”. This is a question that I became interested in earlier in the course, where we were asked to consider how genetic manipulation could be considered an art form in itself.

By some people’s definitions, human’s ability to create art is what separates us from a purely animal being, therefore art and the expression of creativity is precisely necessary in order to be considered intelligent. And while talking animals have long been a part of the cartoon media, this was the first one done in a realistic enough manner to make me question whether a chimp could talk, given the right artistic push.

Thumbs Motif - Source Hammer

 A motif throughout Atkins movie is a human hand giving its thumbs up or thumbs down to various stimuli. However, at the end it does something very interesting, and we see, just for a moment, the camera view pan back and picture the human hand we have been looking at connected to a chimp body.

I love this particular image, as it ties together so well the ‘dystopian’ imagery of the rest of the piece. No matter how ‘intelligent’ we are, we are still evolved from chimps, and at levels we cannot even comprehend all of our motivations come from that animal part of us.

Proof of Attendance - Source Me

"Is There a Unique Human Quality That Separates Us from Animals?" Debate.org. N.p., n.d. Web. 07 June 2015.

"Schedule." The Hammer Museum. UCLA, n.d. Web. 07 June 2015.