ABSTRACT

Such enhancement art shares ideological and philosophical grounds with art that foregrounds the human-machine assemblage as not simply prosthetic condition but as speculating on the possible trajectories for evolution. Stelarc’s work (Third Ear, 2007; Exoskeleton, 1999) and Isa Gordon’s (Psymbiote, Titanium Glove, 2001-to date) examine the possibilities of the human form evolving in conjunction with prosthetic devices and processes, whether the internet or articial skin. is is no mere technofetishism. Rather, they show how the old equation, human body+technological prosthesis, is no longer

valid because humans have always evolved with technology in an assemblage. ere is no originary body and techno-prosthetic. It becomes impossible to sort the origin and the prosthetic because the body itself has been evolved, shaped through extended engagements with nature (seing) and technology. In other words, the human form and function has always internalized the technological artifact or process for its purpose so that “human” and “machine” (where “machine” is a part of the external nonorganic world) are locked into a loop across which information ƒows. e technological object/ process is no prosthesis: at the heart of the human is the prosthesis.