The Legendary Coelacanth, Alex Dodge

Exhibition Label: "Cryptograph: An Exhibition for Alan Turing," Mar-2012, Stephen Goddard In The Legendary Coelacanth, Dodge provides us with a provocative juxtaposition of biological and technological evolution; of genetic code and computer code. The woman in a fetal position, in the same briny world as the coelacanth, puts humanity in direct contact with both biological and electronic realms. Asked about this, the artist expanded: The extended systems of communication that are nested in the work are genetic across multiple species, to more high er-level human systems of language and 22 printing, and eventually non-human systems, but each intertwined with each other. The memory chip is an AMD Am27C020 chip with ultraviolet 2 Mbit erasable, programmable, read-only memory (EPROM). The artist explains: I don't usually have the opportunity to explain the memory chip in detail. I chose this version of memory chip for a few reasons. On one hand the clear window allows the viewer to see the actual etched silicone semiconductor inside. This I thought was a wonderful way of revealing the extension from the seemingly antiquated and traditional printmaking process of engraving that the image on paper is made with... because the process of making integrated circuits is really just another form of printmaking itself. All modern chips are simply made with photo lithography ...very very small photo lithography, but in principle the same photo and acid resist techniques used to print all information since Guttenberg. The other reason I wanted to use this chip is that it is ultraviolet light erasable: that is, you can clear the chip’s memory by exposing it to extreme ultraviolet light. I thought that it was a wonderful sort of symmetry that even the virus contained on the chip could be vulnerable like all other life. The virus itself is a real but harmless computer virus, a modified form of NRLG or NuKE's Random Life Generator. The modified version that I made and dubbed the "coelacanth virus" doesn't have a destructive payload…and wouldn't even be able to run on/infect most of the computers on the net today. SG