-[Anicka VO] Humans have a fear of impermanence.
We go against nature to try to preserve and stabilize and
control something that resists all of that.
In around 2010, I started deep-frying flowers and plants.
This very clunky batter
is almost masking and destroying the flower itself,
and then you subject them to 300-degree hot oil.
♪♪♪
The visual aspects of it was definitely something that I was
aiming for, but the odor of, like, french fries [laughs]
of an artwork or something, that was very much compelling me to,
you know, fry up a batch of these.
♪pensive synth music♪
There's always been an incredible vulnerable aspect to
my work.
Many of my works use this element of deterioration and
perishable materials.
♪♪♪
I'm interested in the kind of mutations that can take place in
these changes.
I work with living creatures,
ultrasound gel,
bacteria,
algae,
kelp,
and soap.
-[Anicka] Looks so good.
Oh my gosh, I forgot all about this.
Wow, it's like seeing the piece for the first time again.
It's really good.
There is such a sensual quality to this soap.
The thing that really keeps haunting me is this glowing,
floating underwater kind of quality.
And it's really hard to do, you know?
-Because resin doesn't do it...
-[Esther] Right.
-[Anicka] Acrylic doesn't do it...
-[Esther] Right.
-And as problematic and volatile as it is,
I'm trying to retain and capture that quality.
I can tell you what to anticipate is that,
because glycerin is a humectant, it will just over time slowly
shrink a little.
-[Esther] And so that's okay?
-If you get dents and cuts and gashes,
that's fine; it's not intended to be pristine and perfect.
♪ethereal oscillating synths♪
-[Anicka VO] I'm quite omnivorous in the areas and
disciplines where I draw from.
Before it's even a fully-fleshed idea,
I start small trials in the studio,
much like you would do in a laboratory.
As the trials start to bear fruit,
we bring in the experts to help us,
whether it's a software engineer or a forensic chemist
or a perfumer.
I look to the natural sciences, synthetic sciences,
artificial intelligence research.
That seems like a very maximalist approach,
but I think that we can't really discount how we are influenced
by all of these different systems and ideas
and information.
-[Anicka] I just want to climb up on these hills...
-[man] [chuckles]
-[Anicka] And just enter into the screen,
-and go into the drawing.
-[man] Yeah.
-How can I translate that then into the outer world --
that feeling of wanting to climb up these hills?
'Cause that's what these anemone panels do for me.
-Yeah.
-You know, that rolling, undulating feeling.
-Yeah.
-But then, when we were talking about more of a kind of a...
Maybe-- I don't know, maybe we need to think about something
more immersive.
♪upbeat bouncing synths♪
-[Anicka VO] We have a very limited imagination when it
comes to machines.
We have a lot of anxiety that they will replace us.
But what if we could relate to them in a more optimistic way?
♪♪♪
I really wanted to merge the biosphere
with the technosphere.
I consulted software engineers, molecular biologists
to create what I called "aerobes."
I was inspired by the comb jellyfish,
the lion's mane mushroom...
The machines respond and detect one another
through high frequency radio waves.
And they're able to detect heat signatures of visitors.
Some aerobes are curious about the visitors,
while some are more shy.
It was really important for me that they were unpredictable,
and that they had space and time for their own evolution.
You know that they're mechanical,
and yet they feel palpably alive.
♪uplifting ethereal music♪
It inspires a feeling of awe and calm,
like you're swimming next to a humpback whale.
I'm always surprised how much power that they had
to quell a lot of anxiety.
With these aerobes, I, too, get to inhabit
this space of wonder.
-[woman VO] Another kind of trace is formidably encapsulated
by the French word "sillage."
It means "the degree to which a perfume's fragrance lingers in
the air when worn."
So in a way, an organism's sillage is a living presence
sensed even in the absence of a body or an author.
-Oh, yeah.
This is the bullfrog.
-[woman] [laughs]
-That is very animal.
-It's like boggy, frog...
-Mm-hm.
-Swampy.
-[woman] Very swampy.
-One of the earliest forms of inquiries in my research
is how we relate to smell, how it informs what I would call
"the biopolitics of our senses."
I grew up in a very pungent home,
and was very keenly and acutely aware of how smell does start to
create these forms of identity around these
invisible scent molecules.
♪ethereal piano music♪
In the Western world, we really tend to reject very pungent
odors as a sign of weakness,
as a sign of being more animal.
We have left those odors behind us to a perfectly-sanitized
world where we control what we can smell and what we can't,
and that is an impossible approach to existence.
I had an exhibition in Milan, and I worked with a French
artist and perfumer, Christophe Laudamiel.
One of the central series are two dryer doors
with two different scents.
One dryer door had a bullfrog aroma.
The other contained this broomstick,
sort of cardboard sweeping-away aroma
after everything has been packed up in your home,
getting ready to evacuate a space that holds
a lot of memories
of love and sadness and despair.
It really is about memory, but also forgetting and letting go.
♪bittersweet string music♪
I always straddle this awkward line between
perishability and non-perishability.
We look to art as a form of preservation,
as a statement on our civilization,
on our species.
And yet, you can't have monumentality without
recognizing the embedded vulnerability around
monumentality.
My work deals a lot with what it means that things are
perpetually blossoming and decaying.
Change is the most constant form that we can acknowledge
and embrace.
♪ ethereal ambient music ♪