What Happens When Stem Cell Science and Performance Art Collide?

How Avant-Garde Experimenters Are Deploying the Tools of Science

In 2007, the Australian performance artist Stelarc started growing an extra ear on his left arm through a series of operations that are still ongoing. The ear is actually made up of his own stem cells woven into a biodegradable frame. Eventually a Bluetooth device will be inserted and Stelarc will be able to hear and communicate through it.

Stelarc’s work focuses on body enhancement, exploring the radical changes our bodies will undergo in the 21st century. He also created “Exoskeleton,” a 1,300-pound prosthetic machine with six legs driven by 18 …

by Arthur I. Miller | February 11, 2015

Can a Concrete Ditch Become an Urban River Playground?

Photographs of Fort Worth’s Trinity River Show a Transformed City Waterway

January 24, 2015

The Trinity River winds its way through the North Central and Coastal plains of Texas, threads through Fort Worth and Dallas, and skirts the Houston area before meeting the Gulf …

Supermodels in the Forbidden City

Chinese Photographer Chen Man Shows Ancient Tradition Meeting Avant-Garde Fantasies

January 17, 2015

by Scarlet Cheng

Chinese photographer Chen Man has been witness to the dizzying modernization of China of the last 20 years. She recalls growing up in the quiet hutongs (alleyways) of …

Larry Sultan’s Visions of Suburbia

Finding Distorted Glamour Among California's Tract Homes and Strip Malls

January 4, 2015

Photographer Larry Sultan grew up in Los Angeles’ quintessentially suburban San Fernando Valley, surrounded by tract homes and strip malls. What might appear bland to others, though, was transformed through …

When Art Disappeared from Our ArtWalk

After Vendors of Nacho Cheese and Knockoff Purses Arrived at Bakersfield’s First Fridays, We Had to Implement New Policies—and Define Art

by David Gordon | January 2, 2015

Things were going well until the crockpots of nacho cheese began showing up next to the knock-off purses in 2013. Once that happened, Bakersfield’s ArtWalk, part of its monthly downtown …

Thank the Catholic Church for Pagan-Inspired Art

Two L.A. Exhibitions Show the Diversity and Creativity Unleashed by the Church’s Patronage Across Centuries

by Clare Kunny and Robin Trento | December 29, 2014

Does art with pagan references belong in a Catholic Church? Two exhibitions on view in L.A. this winter are separated by almost 400 years—but both answer the question with a …

When Science and Science Fiction Collide

Lawrence M. Krauss and Neal Stephenson on Optimism, Inspiration, and the Problem with Human Space Travel

Crowdsourcing in the Name of Science

Citizen Scientists Are Great for Data Collection and So Much More

Did Isaac Newton Need Peer Review?

Scholarly Journals Swear By This Practice of Expert Evaluation. But It’s a New Phenomenon That Isn’t the Only Way To Establish the Facts.

Even Nobel Prize-Winning Physicists Need a Little Luck

Accidental Experiments and Chance Encounters Helped Enrico Fermi Develop the First Nuclear Reactor

Get More Zócalo