Emma Akmakdjian
Borderline between Psychosis & Creativity: Three Generations of Artistic Inheritance
Akmakdjian thinks about ancestral knowledge sharing as an integrated system that does not differentiate between biology and culture, or the mind and body. Comparing the genetic sequence for Neuregulin 1 between Akmakdjian, her mom, and maternal grandmother. Neuregulin 1 is a gene linked to a complicated mental disease, schizophrenia, that Akmakdjian’s maternal grandmother was diagnosed with over a decade ago. Exploring the connection between mental disease and creativity, Akmakdjian questions if there is a threshold between psychosis and creativity? How can this gene encourage or inhibit our ability to see the world? Just like the brain is an infrastructure for thoughts, Akmakdjian imagines a loom can be an infrastructure to spin genetic sequences through labor.
Emma Akmakdjian
Emma Akmakdjian is an interdisciplinary artist who translates climate data and system processes into interactive installations to dissolve barriers between nature and culture. Her work focuses on mariculture and marine ecologies, taking inspiration from her experience as an AAUS scientific scuba diver. Akmakdjian received her MFA from UCLA in Design | Media Arts and has a certificate in Leaders of Sustainability. She pursued her Bachelor of Arts from California State University Channel Islands and studied at L’Accademia di Belle Arti, Firenze, Italy.