tarahrhoda

[tarahrhoda]

Tear Apart Here [kit], (2020)

Inflatable globe, glasses, funnels, tubing, menthol cartridge, glass shadow box

“Tear Apart Here'' is a series of wearable devices that aim to exploit the feedback loop of embodied emotion by inducing tears in the user. The prototypes have various interfaces and modes of activation, but all entail pushing air through a small cartridge of menthol crystals packed between cotton filters. When the minty vapor is directed at the eye, it causes a cool tingling sensation and varying degrees of tear production.

Through initiating the act of crying, users may attempt to harness a tender disposition, witness themselves perform unprocessed grief, and face the necessity of emotional labor through the convenience of consumer culture. The accessory can be employed for anything from wellness routines to enriched theater experiences, like emotional dumbbells or 3D empathy glasses.

The psychosomatic intervention functions both as a speculative technology and as a satirical reflection on the psychological resistance of the climate crisis, the potency of tears and the commodification of grief.

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Lacrimation Tools (2019) 

Silicone bulb, inflatables, glass funnel, tubing, syringe, menthol, cotton

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Leaking Liquid Lattice (2019) 

Intersecting plot of different water bodies [sea, sweat, sink, tank, etc] diffusing and rearticulating each other under an Inverted Compound microscope. There is an inherent intimacy and immediacy in the looseness of wetness and the way it connects us. My work explores these leaky boundaries and liquid transformations as a means of contemplating our entangled futures. What happens to our stories when we rewet them with tongue or tears? Can we recast our collective trauma by rearticulating our leakiness?

[tarahrhoda]

Leaking Liquid Lattice (2019) 

Intersecting plot of different water bodies [sea, sweat, sink, tank, etc] diffusing and rearticulating each other under an Inverted Compound microscope. There is an inherent intimacy and immediacy in the looseness of wetness and the way it connects us. My work explores these leaky boundaries and liquid transformations as a means of contemplating our entangled futures. What happens to our stories when we rewet them with tongue or tears? Can we recast our collective trauma by rearticulating our leakiness?

[tarahrhoda]

Liquid Lattice (2019)

Intersecting bodies of water (tears, sweat, sea, sink, etc.)  plated via electrowetting on 1” X 3” glass slide and photographed under microscope.

[tarahrhoda]

Salt Mine: Resaturated (2018)  

Crystal lattice structure of microscopic tear etched into acrylic and recrystalized with Instant Ocean®

Acrylic, salt solution, gravity drip, iron stand, ellipsoidal spotlight, vase, sand, silk

Spontaneous Emergence of Order curated by Elena Soterakis and Jeannine Bardo at BioBat Art Space, NYC. January 4 – March 15, 2019

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Latitudes Leaking Longitudes, 2019

Agar petri dishes painted with bacteria expressing fluorescent proteins

The work is an interplay of microbial growth and cost displayed as a blend of competing hues and granular gradients. While cross-contamination is typically avoided in microbiology, I tried to optimize it to achieve a more painterly palette. I also experimented with different custom stencils to isolate the microbial lawn into smaller fields.

[tarahrhoda]

Salt Mine: Resaturated (2018)  

Crystal lattice structure of microscopic tear etched into acrylic and recrystalized with Instant Ocean®

Acrylic, salt solution, gravity drip, copper stand, ellipsoidal spotlight, silk, vaseline

[tarahrhoda]

BS&T (2017)

Blood, sweat and tears preserved via spherification, salt, capacitive sensor, micro-controller, air pump, distilled water, glass vessel. [60”x30”x42”]

Installation is activated when viewer places hand on salt switch, which closes the electrical circuit and breathes air into the vessel, causing all the recasted drops of B,S&T to whirl around in view.

[Hustle exhibition at Science Gallery, Detroit. June 16th -September 25th, 2018] 

[tarahrhoda]

OurGlass (2017)

Spinach, ethanol, IV bag, volumetric flask, syringe, ultraviolet light, iron frame, wooden pedestal

Perhaps one of the most remarkable alliances of the biological world is the correlation between photosynthesis and respiration. These two interdependent processes are essential to all life, bonding the survival of flesh and flora. In humans this metabolic exchange occurs as hemoglobin, a red-pigmented protein, circulates oxygen throughout the body’s tissues and returns carbon dioxide to the lungs to be released. Plants, however, compliment this living task by performing the inverse. Photosynthesis relies on chlorophyll, a green pigment in the plant’s chloroplast that captures light and harnesses its energy to convert carbon dioxide and water into glucose. Not only is the resulting simple sugar fuel for the plant to grow, but also provides the oxygen we depend on as a byproduct.

Hemoglobin and chlorophyll are strikingly similar, even mirroring each other down to the molecular level. A particularly astonishing phenomenon is chlorophyll’s ability to retain its light absorption property even when isolated from the plant. When suspended in an alcohol solution and exposed to UV light, chlorophyll releases the energy it was unable to transfer to the rest of the plant as waste. This discharge of energy takes the form of fluorescence, causing the chlorophyll to glow red, like blood. 

Ourglass is a ticking tribute, but also an alarm clock.  Anxious drips swell and reverberate upon impact, a meditative rhythm coaxes the abstraction of nature on tap. Not a particularly distressing alert, but a timepiece trophy for the conscious commercial- an aesthetically privileged lure to stopwatch and hold the trouble. Nature suspended and our demands staged, the extra/action imposed.

[Axis Mundi exhibition curated by Regan Rosburg presented by PlatteForum in conjunction with Denver’s Biennial of the Americas September 16-October 7, 2017. Photos by Scott McCullough]

[tarahrhoda]

Ourglass (2017)

Spinach, ethanol, IV bag, volumetric flask, syringe, ultraviolet light, iron frame, wooden pedestal

Perhaps one of the most remarkable alliances of the biological world is the correlation between photosynthesis and respiration. These two interdependent processes are essential to all life, bonding the survival of flesh and flora. In humans this metabolic exchange occurs as hemoglobin, a red-pigmented protein, circulates oxygen throughout the body’s tissues and returns carbon dioxide to the lungs to be released. Plants, however, compliment this living task by performing the inverse. Photosynthesis relies on chlorophyll, a green pigment in the plant’s chloroplast that captures light and harnesses its energy to convert carbon dioxide and water into glucose. Not only is the resulting simple sugar fuel for the plant to grow, but also provides the oxygen we depend on as a byproduct.

Hemoglobin and chlorophyll are strikingly similar, even mirroring each other down to the molecular level. A particularly astonishing phenomenon is chlorophyll’s ability to retain its light absorption property even when isolated from the plant. When suspended in an alcohol solution and exposed to UV light, chlorophyll releases the energy it was unable to transfer to the rest of the plant as waste. This discharge of energy takes the form of fluorescence, causing the chlorophyll to glow red, like blood. 

Ourglass is a ticking tribute, but also an alarm clock.  Anxious drips swell and reverberate upon impact, a meditative rhythm coaxes the abstraction of nature on tap. Not a particularly distressing alert, but a timepiece trophy for the conscious commercial- an aesthetically privileged lure to stopwatch and hold the trouble. Nature suspended and our demands staged, the extra/action imposed. 

[tarahrhoda]

Agar Remix (2017)

Charcoal agar sculptures painted with bacteria (E.coli) that was genetically modified to express fluorescent proteins that were naturally found in a jellyfish.

28”x24”x24”

[FACTT: Festival of Art & Science Transdisciplinary & Transnational — NYC]

[tarahrhoda]

Tear Crystals (2019)

Out of all the bodies of water that entangle life, tears might be one of the most potent.

While the tear samples I have collected over the past 10 years range from mundane to traumatic, they were all discharged as the result of a psychological or physical threshold, a swell of overwhelm. These charged liquids are an archive of distilled moments, dislocated from their time and place, but saturated with memory. I reanimate the suspended samples by documenting them drying under the microscope, letting them climax into crystal formations over and over again. 

When moisture evaporates out of a saline solution the salt crystallizes in a formation of least resistance. The crystal lattice patterns are shaped by both the elemental conditions under which they transition and the concentration of salt reacting to other contents of the sample. A teardrop may be one of the most unique bodies of saltwater to visualize transforming microscopically, as the lipids that keep our eyes lubricated form a resilient ring around the drop, protecting the evaporating center from the demanding outer surface tension as the crystallization slowly trickles inward. This physical property speaks back to the human condition and the construct of the contained self. 

[tarahrhoda]

Fluid Matter: Liquid and Life in Motion was curated by Angelique Spaninks and William Meyers at MU Art Space in Eindhoven. (video by OddOne Productions)

BS&T (2016)

Blood, sweat and tears are precious bodily fluids; rich substances that we expend in all we do. To pay tribute to these processes the artist collected her own blood, sweat and tears, which were then recast in droplet form by a process called ‘spherification’: a molecular gastronomy technique that takes advantage of a chemical reaction and forms a thin membrane around the fluid.

[tarahrhoda]

BS&T (2014)

Blood, sweat and tears are universal currencies for living. They are, essentially, a fluid exchange rate for the body's processes. As one’s flesh experiences both the physiological and psychological realms, it intermittently sheds these rich substances that are crucial to the biological systems that sustain us.

In order to personally memorialize this process, samples were collected from the artist’s body and recasted back into the teardrop form using a molecular gastronomy technique called spherification. This process utilizes the chemical reaction between sodium alginate and calcium lactate to form a membrane that encapsulates the sample.

The interactive installation applies an Arduino micro-controller and a capacitive touch sensor to modify an electrical circuit. This circuit can only be closed when the salt pile is physically touched, prompting the viewer to function as the switch. When the viewer makes contact, the circuit closes and activates an air pump, causing the teardrop forms to whirl around, bringing life back to the vessel. Salt is employed as the tactile switch, because it is the sodium chloride concentration in one’s body that allows it to be an electrically conductive medium, maintaining voltages and carrying electrical impulses.  

[tarahrhoda]

Agar Remix (2016)  

Charcoal agar sculptures painted with bacteria (E. coli) that was genetically modified to express GFP, a fluorescent protein naturally found in a jelly fish.

While the green fluorescent protein was derived from a single species of jellyfish, its application as a scientific tool has illuminated our greater understanding of life’s processes. By allowing us to literally shine a light on gene expression and cell behavior, we can observe the invisible molecular mechanisms that govern the biological world around us. Agar, a simple gelatinous substrate that hosts our efforts to collage life by mixing, matching and propagating the characteristics of different organisms, is the canvas of the laboratory. As an artist dabbling in biology one of the first things I understood was that Agar is the canvas of the laboratory. 

[tarahrhoda]

Skinfinity (2016)

Agar painted with bacteria (E. coli) that was genetically modified to express GFP, a fluorescent protein naturally found in a jelly fish.

From luring out freckles to scorching skin, exposure of ultraviolet light to flesh is a uniquely intimate exchange with the Sun. Reflecting both the night’s complexion and the mundane, but grand, gesture of being touched by our biggest star, the artist’s melanin distribution was mapped out with a fluorescent protein on an agar casted face.