SPECULATIVE GOODS 2

In this ongoing project, I explore the visual aspects of fictional products and creations that are still being developed.

The Case of Somaforming

Volume 2 of Speculative Goods is based on a scene from my favorite hopepunk novel, To Be Taught, If Fortunate, written by Becky Chambers.

This scene implies that if there is to be space travel, there is the possibility of a kinder approach when exploring other planets. We can do so through somaforming, a technology where the explorer’s body changes itself to suit the planet it is visiting, by using an enzyme patch, instead of changing the planet to be welcomed by it.

In these images, I attempted to visualize the effects of the enzyme patch on the skin. I based the scene on a specific mission where the astronauts' bodies needed to catch and refract light in order to navigate the dark and icy surface of the planet they were visiting.

For the patch’s design, I was heavily inspired by Lynn Randolph’s famous Cyborg painting, which was previously used to illustrate Donna Haraway’s Cyborg Manifesto.

I focused on creating something similar to the circuits present on the chest of the human figure in the painting, but instead of hard edges and square shapes, I aimed for curves and sinuous lines, with the intention of representing the kinder approach Chambers mentions in her writing.

The first try to create the effects of the enzyme patch was to put glitter-like material in the skin, but in trying to respect Chamber’s preference for the lighter touch, I ended up creating a material that resembled underwater materials like pearls and deep-sea creature’s skin, that would still represent the light refraction but with a softer glow.

Somaforming is not entirely fictional, Chambers based the somaforming approach on actual research done by MIT Ph.D. candidate, Lisa Nip, on using synthetic biology to solve the challenges of human space travel. This research and Chamber’s novel open the conversation on how to do space travel, how to change our genetics without losing our humanity, and how to respect the planet’s surface without the need for the incisive terraforming process.