Wed, 13 Sep 2006 12:00am

MA | Auto-what?

It probably makes sense to start my blog with an explanation of what is meant by 'Autopoiesis' and why it is of interest to me (by the way, I will link to Wikipedia wherever possible to give readers the opportunity to find out more about the terms I use).

The word was first used biologists Francisco Varela and Humberto Maturana in 1973 to describe a 'system' that has the ability to regenerate and reproduce. The example they used in their work was that of the biological cell, which both maintains its structure over time and can make copies of itself.

Following Verela and Maturana's use of the term it was picked up by people working in other fields, including psychology and sociology, to describe phenomena that behave in similar ways.

The concept of autopoiesis has fascinated me as an artist ever since I first came across it and I have wanted to produce a major piece of work about it for a number of years.

Author: Sean Clark