No subject

Shani said that after Pigeonblog she
=B3=8Acame across this research at Cornell (?), of people training bees to
sniff out chemical weapons. I was thinking that they could probably be
trained
to sniff out any chemical. So I was wondering what type of carcinogens we
are
likely to find in an urban environment that would be interesting to =8Csniff
out.=B9 Lucinha might also be trained, so it could be a whole canine/bee
collaboration thing, as long as she won't get stung! =B3

=20
Her plans seemed to be around nose training for Lucinha dog. She had
actually taken Lucinha to a =B3nose-work
workshop=B2 outside NYC to begin this practice (an hour ride each way on the
bus).
I am interested in similar activities of cancer-sniffing dog training.
Shani=B9s seemed to want to pursue dogs sniffing carcinogens =AD sophisticated
stuff.
=20

Other excerpts from Shani=B9s emails (provided by Robert =AD thank you!)
included an amazing exchange with her dog trainer,
Katrina Krings. Shani was trying to outline what specifically she needed to
train Lucinha, her dog companion, for (as well as other service dogs). So
these
are the kinds of things we =AD as perpetrators of this service dog work
=ADneed to
consider going forward:

=20
=B31: things for
Lucinha to learn to identify and find, even when hidden inside of something
(needs to find by smell).
Keys
glasses
phone
small wallet=20
big wallet
Wallet=20

2: needs to learn to bring me anything she can carry when I point at it.

3: needs to learn to pick things up gently (glasses, phone etc. ).

4: needs to alert me to anything I appear to drop accidentally,
immediately. Should only go and
get it, if I ask her for it. [this accidental dropping happens a lot]

5: (variation of no. 4) alerting me if I appear to forget my things, such
as a Jacket, scarf
etc.  on a counter, restaurant table, etc . Anything she knows clearly
belongs to me and I leave behind without deliberately giving it to
someone.=B2=20


What if we could train dogs ourselves to help service people - and it
didn't cost tens of
thousands of dollars? What if we could help train dogs to give/loan/share
the
dog companion with friends who were sick, disabled and impaired? How can
we train
dogs to help people in the ways that they need? What do our dogs think of
this
assistance/service? We have to ask Lucinha that!

I found a newspaper article from 2010 on Shani=B9s website about service
dogs helping veterans recover from post-traumatic shock. She was ahead of
her
own process here =AD foreshadowing her own needs and interests. Or maybe she
knew
what was ahead.

=20
In Tactical Biopolitics, in the introduction, Shani and Kavita Philips
wrote about the
importance of =B3inter- and =8C(un-) disciplinary=B9 exchanges among
practitioners
and theorists from various backgrounds, always privileging collaboration
and
coordination with larger strategy-based movements of resistance to
hegemonic
forces.=B2 This very resistance and multi-layered practice is at the core of
Shani=B9s work and life.
=20

Thanks to her friends for making her life a rich one =AD it is evidenced
through these postings.



On 2/22/13 10:51 PM, "Renate Ferro" <rtf9 at cornell.edu> wrote:

>----------empyre- soft-skinned space----------------------
>Thanks so much to Paul, Heidi and Claire for posting this week on
>-empyre.  We continue to talk about Beatriz' life and work this last
>week of February.  In New York on this Sunday the 24th many of
>Beatriz' family and friends will gather at Postmasters Gallery.  For
>those of us too far away to travel to New York City we send our
>sincerest sympathies to all of you.  Tim and I are hoping that many of
>you who have not added to this discussion in honor of Beatriz will do
>so before we close the discussion on Thursday the 28th.
>
>This week on empyre we invite special guests Natalie Jeremijenko and
>Kathy High.  Their biographies are below.  Welcome to both of you!
>
>
>Kathy High is Associate Professor Of Video and New Media in the
>Department of Arts, at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI), Troy,
>NY. She is an interdisciplinary artist, educator working with biology
>and time based arts. In the last ten years she has become interested
>in working with living systems, animals and art, considering
>thesocial, political and ethical dilemmas of biotechnology and
>surrounding industries. She has received awards from the Guggenheim
>Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation, and National Endowment for the
>Arts. Her art works, have been shown in film festivals, galleries and
>museums, including Documenta 13, Guggenheim Museum, Museum of Modern
>Art, among others.
>Her co-edited book The Emergence of Video Processing Tools: Television
>Becoming Unglued, with Sherry Miller Hocking of the Experimental
>Television Center and Mona Jimenez of the Moving Image Preservation
>Program at NYU, will be published by Intellect Books (UK), 2013.  The
>book presents stories of the development of early video tools and
>systems designed and built by artists and technologists during the
>late 1960s and 70s, and how that history of collaborations among
>inventors, designers and artists has affected contemporary
>tool-makers.
>
>Natalie Jeremijenko
>Beatriz and I both worked on technological opportunities for social
>and ecological change including : air quality projects using sensors
>attached to pigeons and robotic dogs respectively  towards redesigning
>human/animal relationship; both worked on developing alternative
>biomedical institutions that recognized participatory research and
>food and nutrition-based work.... and the convivial contexts for
>rethinking these.
>Animal behavior, gmo food, representations of cancer .... it seemed we
>were automatically attracted to similar issues, and of course I could
>not have been luckier in this respect. Aside from the professional
>overlap I loved her as a friend .... she was incredibly dear to me.
>
>Named one of the most influential women in technology 201, one of the
>inaugural top young innovators by MIT Technology Review, and a current
>Creative Capital awardee,  Natalie Jeremijenko directs the
>Environmental Health Clinic, and is an Associate Professor in the
>Visual Art Department, NYU, affiliated with the Computer Science
>Department and Environmental Studies program.  Previously she was on
>the Visual Arts faculty at UCSD, Faculty of Engineering at Yale
>University, a visiting professor at Royal College of Art in London,
>and a Distinguished Visiting Professor in the Public Understanding of
>Science at Michigan State University. Her degrees are in biochemistry,
>engineering, neuroscience and History and Philosophy of Science.
>Jeremijenko was included in the 2011 Venice Bieniale, the 2006 Whitney
>Biennial of American Art, also in 1997,  and the Cooper Hewitt
>Smithsonian Design Triennial 2006-7. In 2010 Neuberger Museum produced
>a retrospective exhibition surveying recent work, entitled Connected
>Environments; in addition to a solo exhibition entitled X in November,
>2010 at the University of Technology Sydney. Currently on view:  Civic
>Action, an exhibition of urban plans, at Socrates Sculpture Park,
>Other recent exhibitions include Civic Action @  Noguchi Museum;
>talk2me exhibition at MOMA, and the ongoing Cross(x)Species Adventure
>Club.
>
>
>--=20
>
>Renate Ferro
>Visiting Assistant Professor of Art
>Cornell University
>Department of Art, Tjaden Hall Office #420
>Ithaca, NY  14853
>Email:   <rtf9 at cornell.edu>
>URL:  http://www.renateferro.net
>      http://www.privatesecretspubliclies.net
>Lab:  http://www.tinkerfactory.net
>
>Managing Co-moderator of -empyre- soft skinned space
>http://empyre.library.cornell.edu/
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empyre
>_______________________________________________
>empyre forum
>empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
>http://www.subtle.net/empyre