Joe Davis (b.1950, Delaware, USA)
Artist, researcher. Graduated in 1973 with a BA in Creative Arts from Mt. Angel College (Oregon, USA). His works incorporate diverse media, including laser and electron beam applications, optical telecommunications and robotics and microfabrication systems to search for extraterrestrial intelligence. Davis has performed extensive research in molecular biology, microbiology and bioinformatics, producing genetic databases and new biological art forms. He has created a number of large-scale contemporary artworks: Microvenus (1986), based on synthesized DNA and genetically modified bacteria; Poetica Vaginal (1986), recorded from the vaginal contractions of ballerinas and translated into radio signals, beamed from MIT's Millstone radar to Epsilon Eridani, Tau Ceti, etc.; Riddle of Life (1994), used genetically modified organisms; Audio Microscope (2000), translated light information into sound, allowing an individual to «hear» living cells; Milky Way (2002), placed a map of the Milky Way into the ear of a transgenic mouse. Davis championed a space shuttle experiment, shooting an electron gun into the magnetosphere to create the first artificial aurora. Between 1980-1982, he worked at the German Technical High School in Bremen. From 1982-1992, Davis taught graduate students in the Master of Science in Visual Studies Department at the MIT Center for Advanced Visual Studies and undergraduate students in painting and mixed media at the Rhode Island School of Design. For over 25 years, he has held academic and research positions at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Since 1990, Davis has been a Research Affiliate at the MIT Laboratory of Molecular Structure, MIT Department of Biology (Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA).