My recent return to Perth, Australia from Europe was a physiological and psychological crash landing. I transported my body / psyche from peak summer to counterpeak winter, travelling back to the southern hemisphere on June 20 (near solstice) and experiencing 6 hours less daylight per day after my arrival. This was a jarring slosh of circadian rhythm chaos and muddied brain chemical soup on top of jetlag, which caused me a period of dark despair. I have excellent coping skills for dealing with life’s hardships, but this was beyond those for a time; there was nothing to do but wait out my body’s slow acclimation. This circumstance, however, was not the deepest source of my distress but rather exacerbated the real cause.
Such a harsh adjustment would have been better navigable with the right kind of social support, but my peer group and research community have been strategically dismantled by the university, in their short-sighted dissolution of SymbioticA. For me, the temporal and geographical isolation of Perth has always been buffered by the excellent community / career resources that SymbioticA has had to offer, but this is unfortunately no longer the case. It was only after experiencing the supportive warmth and healthy interdependence of the bioart and science communities that I worked with recently in Europe (thanks to Art Laboratory Berlin and FEMeeting), that I was able to fully grasp what I identify as psychosocial violence and inhumane disregard perpetuated by institutional (mis)management of my PhD experience at UWA.
SymbioticA International Centre of Excellence in Biological Art is a shining star of the bioart world—the first facility of its kind, with an over 20-year history of top award-winning and cutting edge projects. These various projects have been conceived and executed by two of its highly recognized co-founders, Oron Catts and Dr. Ionat Zurr, as well as by a roster of some of the world’s edgiest artists and scientists working with biomedia.1 Indeed, SymbioticA’s most recent project garnered a prestigious Award of Distinction at Ars Electronica (again) this year.2 I can’t overstate the influence that SymbioticA has had on my own career trajectory. I came from the opposite side of the planet, leaving my life behind specifically to work with them to complete a PhD. It was not UWA’s much-touted Group of Eight (Go8)3 reputation that I came for, but rather for SymbioticA’s impact, ethos and community.
Over the past few months, I have had a number of concerned people approach me to ask, “What’s happening with SymbioticA now?” Clearly, nobody external to UWA really knows, and one might wonder why that is. The last thing that is widely publicly known about the fate of SymbioticA is a “Save SymbioticA” petition that was quickly circulated in October 2022 and which almost immediately garnered close to 15,000 signatures.4 These signatories included UWA staff, faculty, and alumni as well as other highly regarded academics, artists and researchers from across the planet.
In late 2022, just before the holiday break, the School of Human Sciences at UWA made the decision to close SymbioticA, with no possible recourse. This followed a rushed and last-minute consultation period with SymbioticA-affiliated postgraduate students who had been previously overlooked. I was interviewed as part of those consultations, and certain promises were made to me but the ultimate outcome is the same. The closure would have been immediate, but for the body of students who are currently enrolled in a Master of Biological Arts program through SymbioticA.5 This program has now been discontinued as part of the closure, but UWA still has an obligation to support these students through the completion of their program requirements, which will take approximately 12 more months for the last cohort. PhD candidates such as myself are considered independent of SymbioticA since we fall more broadly under the Graduate Research School. This is regardless of the fact that my office is in the SymbioticA lab, my lab work is done with financial support through the SymbioticA operating budget and as I previously stated, SymbioticA is my core research community. Their termination will be concurrent with the last graduate from the Master of Biological Arts program. Thankfully, I will complete my PhD before this but I go out limping with their injuries.
Despite the fact that SymbioticA stays (barely) alive for the next year while Masters students are still enrolled, they have been immobilized. There are no more administrative supports in place for hosting programming: no more of their valuable Friday afternoon lectures by visiting researchers, no more artists-in-residence bringing their fresh perspectives and research projects, no more collaboration opportunities, no more newsletters with important announcements. There is no more of the invigorating group cohesion I once enjoyed, since morale has been destroyed and the only administrative support staff member was let go as soon as the decision towards closure was made. SymbioticA has been left to slowly suffocate while news of their dissolution stays muffled through protracted bureaucratic closure processes that impose silence. Perhaps then, my despair can serve a productive purpose after all—leaking some truth around a dirty gag.
I will leave you with the glint of something in the rubble though, dear reader: there may be post-SymbioticA initiatives to keep an eye out for…
Peruse a sampling of these projects that were initiated by residencies at SymbioticA over the years: https://www.symbiotica.uwa.edu.au/residents
You can read about that project here: https://calls.ars.electronica.art/2023/prix/winners/8743/
More about this incorporated ranking system here: https://go8.edu.au/about/the-go8
That petition can be found here: https://www.change.org/p/save-symbiotica
More about the MBA program here: https://www.symbiotica.uwa.edu.au/courses/mbiolarts
But why though??!! It’s so hard to understand.
"I was able to fully grasp what I identify as psychosocial violence and inhumane disregard perpetuated by institutional (mis)management of my PhD experience at UWA" This hit me HARD. Perth can be so incredibly isolating for artists trying to push the needle forward, and Symbiotica was a rare oasis for this. Its constant disregard and finally closure by the university only further cements Western Australia as a corner of the world that is NOT open to cutting edge, vital science criticism and creative practice. Thank you so much for sharing this WhiteFeather! Artist accounts from the inside like this will only become more vital to the history we are all trying to write.