Naming a festival after a flowering tree and then pinning it to a specific week of the year occasionally presents the awkward reality of no blooms on trees at festival time.  We are worried about that this year. But not undone!

Inspired by AmyYoung’s grafted cacti (on display at the Pomerene Center) we invite the community to help correct nature’s error at the opening event of DW2010 Make it Grow.

Artist Statement

I am interested in the way that our increasingly enhanced and extended human capabilities allow us to perceive the world in micro and macro modes, explore it more thoroughly and even make attempts to remedy past ecological errors. That technology can simultaneously ruin, reveal, reinvent and repair nature is a paradox I investigate in my work. Amy M. Youngs

About Rearming the Spineless Opuntia: The plant inside this device is both interactive with people and protected from them. Its metal armor closes up when approached and opens when people move away from it. Through cloning and micropropagation technologies, humankind has engineered creations such as the Spineless Opuntia, a cactus that lacks its original defense mechanism against those who eat them. This sculpture embodies my impulse to protect this vulnerable, human-engineered creation. But it also reveals the folly of protection in its heavy reliance on technology. Watch video

Artist Bio

Amy M. Youngs creates biological art, interactive sculptures and digital media works that explore the complex relationship between technology and our changing concept of nature and self. She has exhibited her works nationally and internationally at venues such as the Biennale of Electronic Arts (Perth, Australia), Te Papa Museum (Wellington, New Zeland), John Michael Kohler Arts Center (Sheboygan, Wisconsin), the Tweed Museum (Duluth, MN), Circulo de Bellas Artes (Madrid, Spain), the Visual Arts Museum, Pace Digital Gallery (New York, NY), the Art Institute of Chicago's Betty Rymer Gallery, Vedanta Gallery, Northern Illinois University Art Gallery (Chicago, IL), Blasthaus, (San Francisco, CA) and Works (San Jose, CA). Her artwork has been reviewed in publications such as, The Chicago Reader, Toronto Star, San Francisco Bay Guardian, RealTime and Artweek. Youngs has published several essays, including one on genetic art in the journal Leonardo and another on art, technology and ecology in the international art publication Nouvel Objet in 2001. Her work was profiled in the recent book, Art in Action, Nature, Creativity & our Collective Future. She has lectured on her work widely, including at Columbia College, (Chicago, IL), the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Boston, Massachusetts), the Australian Center For the Moving Image (Melbourne, Australia) and the Walker Art Center (Minneapolis, MN) and has participated in panels at professional conferences such as the Women’s Caucus for the Arts and the College Arts Association. In 2002, Youngs was awarded an Individual Artist Fellowship Grant from the Ohio Arts Council. Youngs received a BA from San Francisco State University, graduating Summa Cum Laude and Art Student Honoree of her class. She was awarded a full Merit Scholarship to study at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where she completed her MFA in 1999. Youngs is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Art at The Ohio State University. She was born in 1968 in Chico, California.