Wellcome Collection, a museum and library focused on health, is presenting the exhibition Genetic Automata, featuring a series of video works by Larry Achiampong and David Blandy. The artists explore race and identity in an age of avatars, videogames and DNA ancestry.

The four videos in the series investigate where deeply ingrained ideas about race come from and the role that science has played in shaping these perceptions. The artists use imagery and soundtracks from contemporary videogames, particularly those with dystopian science fiction plots that involve the misuse of genetic material, to question how scientific racism is reproduced in society.

The exhibition premieres '_GOD_MODE_', the newest video in the series, commissioned by Wellcome Collection, Black Cultural Archives and Wellcome Connecting Science. This video explores the roots and implications of scientific racism, delving into the ramifications that eugenics practices have had and still have on societies today, influencing such aspects as education, healthcare and politics.

Another video in the series is 'A Lament for Power', which investigates how science can be used to understand the world alongside its potential for commercial and political exploitation. The video centres on Henrietta Lacks, a Black American woman whose cells were taken without her knowledge and have been used to make world-changing discoveries such as mapping the human genome and developing vaccines.

Genetic Automata is a provocative exploration of how race and identity are constructed and contested through science and technology. Wellcome Collection is part of Wellcome, which supports science to solve the urgent health challenges facing everyone.

The link has been copied!