NEURoTICA: bio

NEURoTICA: bio
CCCB - Centre de Cultura Contemporania de Barcelona
Barcelona - Spain
Friday 24th November, 2006 at 7.00 pm

"[Contemporary man] is blind to the fact that, with all his rationality and efficiency, he is possessed by "powers" that are beyond his control. His gods and demons have not disappeared at all; they have merely got new names. They keep him on the run with restlessness, vague apprehensions, psychological complications, an insatiable need for pills, alcohol, tobacco, food - and, above all, a large array of neuroses."
(Jung, 1964:82)

Neurotica is a research project that examines the anxieties of contemporary society, generated by the rapid advances made in science and technology, and looks at the way individuals and the community is coping with these innovations and their offshoots. The project has been designed and initiated by Capsula http://www.capsula.org.es/, an investigation group based in Barcelona, Spain, launched by Monica Bello and Ulla Taipale that generates cultural products exploring the interrelations between arts, science and nature.

The first phase of Neurotica is exploring society’s perception of biotechnology and the hopes and fears associated with it. The project will be launched by a conference presented at CCCB, Center of Contemporanean Culture of Barcelona on 24th November 2006. During the event Californian based artist and inventor Natalie Jeremijenko will present her views on these issues, followed by the interventions and comments of Dr. Alfonso Valencia, a biologist and head of The Spanish National Center of Biotechnology and Dr. Fabio Tropea, sociologist and language analyst.

The conference is part of "NOW - Meetings in the present continuous" http://www.cccb.org/now/ang/index.htm at the Centre de Cultura Contemporania de Barcelona (CCCB). NOW is a project that reflects on the present on the basis of the scientific, technological, artistic, social and spiritual transformations taking place at the start of the 21st century. It aims to bring together local and international agents promoting a change of paradigm in current society.