DOROTEA DOLINŠEK: "Biosymbiotic Exoskeleton"

You are invited to the opening of the exhibition, which will take place on 30 July 2025 at 20:00 at Xcenter.

The ‘Biosymbiotic Exoskeleton’ is an inflatable spacesuit that enables a symbiotic coexistence with bacteria, fungi, archaea, and viruses that constitute an individual’s microbiome in a radically extraterrestrial environment. Thus, the spacesuit becomes an ecology of organisms that disassembles the human body into parts, for which specific care and maintenance procedures can be established to prevent dysbiosis, which is detrimental to the normal functioning of the body.

The body, disassembled per partes, thus becomes an organized system for which living conditions can be created that differ from those known on planet Earth, thereby transforming ways of existence. As a reverse engineering of an imaginary space situation, in which the human body alters its form, we can create projections of possible survival on an ecologically altered planet, where the human body is deconstructed into functionalities, rhizomatically connected among different species.

The microbiome, as an organ, plays a crucial role in survival, not only in an ontological sense but also in a very personal, intimate way. To be alive means to be in symbiosis with non-human living systems that extend far beyond the physical boundaries of the human body. 

Photo: Matjaž Rušt