ART PROJECT DEVELOPMENT

My long-standing work about bioethical issues has deepened my interest in obesity, drugs and self-regulation (or lack thereof). Obesity and obesity-related diabetes is a rapidly growing, world-wide health epidemic. With the prevalence of fast food, sugar subsidies, and cure-all pills, the United States has patterned itself in such a way that contributes to our deteriorating health. To address these concerns, I am now developing a large-scale, participatory public project that critiques an environment whose design contributes to the obesity epidemic. “My Body My Temple” will address the issue in three ways 1) by constructing sugar skull installations to commemorate the dead and encourage action to prevent such death; 2) by building large outdoor sugar structures that, like a body not treated well, soften and collapse; and 3) by projecting large scale videos of sugar consumption onto buildings throughout the United States, with a concentration in the south, where the problems are the greatest. Each of the projects will address such issues as how we might be better architects of our bodies, our brains and our communities.