invisible visibility / Virtual Sculpture
"...(art)n betrays the peculiar rapporchement of art and science in a technological present where the visual field is saturated by the dynamic mechanics of video graphics."
Laura Trippi Curator, The New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York 1989
"The work is straightforward, moving, and chilling."Tom Finkelpearl Curator, P.S. 1 New York 1990
A burst of hope: editing the brca gene
A Burst of Hope: Editing the BRCA Gene, 2022
Ellen Sandor & (art)n: Diana Torres, Azadeh Gholizadeh
Caren Rudman
Collage artworks from the Richard and Ellen Sandor Family Collection, featuring Diane Arbus, Lotte Jacobi, Dora Maar, Judy Dater
Digital PHSCologram Sculpture
32"x 53"x 73"
pruning the neuronal forest & Mighty Microglia
Mighty Microglia, 2019
Ellen Sandor & (art)n: Diana Torres and Azadeh Gholizadeh
Beth Stevens, The Stevens Lab: Lasse Dissing-Olesen
Special thanks to Caleb Sandor Taub
Stevens Lab at Boston Children’s Hospital and The Stanley Center at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard
Virtual Photograph/Digital PHSCologram Sculpture: Duratrans, Kodalth, Plexiglas, wood
48 x 48 inches
CRISPR-CAS9 (A ray of light)
Each panel depicts a different stage of CRISPR-Cas9 genome editing to replace a harmful mutation. First, the RNA-guided Cas9 protein searches for its matching DNA target. Next, the guide RNA pairs with one strand of the target DNA, and then Cas9 cuts both strands. Finally, the cell's repair machinery seals up the break by patching in a stretch of healthy DNA.
CRISPR-Cas9 (A Ray of Light), 2017
Ellen Sandor & (art)n: Chris Kemp, Diana Torres, and Azadeh Gholizadeh
Jennifer Doudna, The Doudna Lab: RNA Biology, UC Berkeley Megan Hochstrasser, Innovative Genomics Institute, UC Berkeley
Inspired by Caleb Sandor Taub
Virtual Photograph/Digital PHSCologram Sculpture Details: Duratrans, Kodalth, Plexiglas
33 x 33 x 62 inches
Garden of digital delights
Garden of Digital Delights is an homage to five unique artists who were inspired by flora culture, spanning innovations in vintage photographic processes, such as those explored by Man Ray, Imogen Cunningham and Robert Mapplethorpe, juxtaposed with video installation art by Nam June Paik and the computer generated imagery of Charles Csuri. Each panel is part of an electronic bouquet that lyrically connects these artists with nature, featuring virtual orchids and calla lilies that are illuminated as a digital sculpture reminiscent of Paik's Garden of Earthly Delights.
Garden of Digital Delights, 2011
Ellen Sandor & (art)n: Chris Kemp, Diana Torres and Michael Cone
Digital PHSCologram Sculpture and Base: Duratrans, Kodalith, and Plexiglas
24 x 24 x 64 inches
the magnificent micelle
The Magnificent Micelle, 2013
Ellen Sandor & (art)n: Chris Kemp and Diana Torres
Matthew Tirrell, Pritzker Director of the Institute for Molecular Engineering (IME), University of Chicago
Peter Allen, Scientific Visualization Director, UC Santa Barbara
Digital PHSCologram Sculpture and Base: Duratrans, Kodalith, and Plexiglas
30 x 30 x 63 inches
THE PROMISE OF THINGS YET TO BE
Commissioned by Nuveen Investments
The Promise of Things Yet to Be, 2005
Ellen Sandor & (art)n: Nick Gaul and Janine Fron
PHSCologram Sculpture: Duratrans, Kodalith, Plexiglas
30.5 x 30.5 x 30.5 inches
Telomeres Project on Imminent Immortality
Shown during "Genomic Issue(s): Art and Science" at The Graduate Center Art Gallery, City University of New York, 2003 to celebrate the Human Genome Project. The interactive sculpture documented the potential of the telomerase enzyme:
In 2009, three U.S. researchers won the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine for solving "a major problem in biology," the Nobel Committee announced Monday, as reported in CNN.
Elizabeth H. Blackburn, Carol W. Greider and Jack W. Szostak are credited with discovering how chromosomes are protected against degradation -- a field that could shed light on human aging and diseases, including cancer.
"The award of the Nobel Prize recognizes the discovery of a fundamental mechanism in the cell, a discovery that has stimulated the development of new therapeutic strategies," the committee said in a news release.
The three will share the $1.4 million prize. It is the 100th year the prize will be awarded, and the first time that any Nobel in the sciences has gone to more than one woman. The work that won them the prize took place in the late 1970s and early 1980s.
It centers on structures at the end of chromosomes called telomeres and an enzyme that forms them, called telomerase.
Telomeres Project on Imminent Immortality, 2001
Ellen Sandor & (art)n: Thomas J. McLeish, Fernando Orellana, Nichole Maury, Todd Margolis, and Janine Fron
Steve Boyer, Skyboy Interactive
Special thanks to Stephan Meyers
Interactive PHSCologram Sculpture: Duratrans, Kodalith, Plexiglas
naci
Commissioned by the Janet Annenberg Hooker Hall of Geology, Gems and Minerals, Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History
An immersive PHSCologram installation view of the inner workings of a salt crystal
NaCl, 1997
Ellen Sandor & (art)n: Stephan Meyers and Janine Fron
Special thanks to Robert Mitz and Brian Mustanski; and Terry Healy, Douglas Gallagher
PHSCologram Sculpture Installation: Duratrans, Kodalith, Plexiglas
(28) 27 x 27 inches
sapce remix
Space Remix, 1993
Ellen Sandor & (art)n: Stephan Meyers and Janine Fron
PHSCologram Sculpture: computer interleaved Crosfield Cibachrome and Kodalith films mounted on plexiglas, framed in a metal lightbox
80 x 17.5 x 100 inches
(6) panels 20 x 24 inches
messiah
Messiah, 1987/1990
Ellen Sandor & (art)n: Randy Johnson, Jim Zanzi, and Stephan Meyers
Dan Sandin and Tom DeFanti, Electronic Visualization Lab, School of Art and Design, University of Illinois at Chicago
Special thanks to Dr. Roberta Glick, Kevin Magginis and Lisa Stone
Vintage PHSColograms: darkroom and computer interleaved Crosfield Cibachrome and Kodalith films, all mounted on plexiglas
96 x 60 inches overall with (6) 24 x 20 inches panels
"High technology and social awareness meld successfully in (art)n's beautiful but awesome stealth negative constructions. Vibrant purples and blues radiate from their cross-shaped sculpture titled "Messiah". Hands, faces, and symbols take on the three-dimensional depth found in laser imagery. The unusual presence of this piece is seductive. However, the power-packed punch of this work strikes once the viewer learns that the abstract shapes are micro-images of the actual AIDS virus. The same impact is produced by "Papilloma Virus, 3rd Edition". (art)n's pieces represent some of the most successful and inventive uses of this advanced technology."
- Elaine A. King, Ph.D.,Director, Carnegie Mellon Art Gallery & Associate Professor, History of Art 1990
We knew we wanted to use colorized CAT scans of an anonymous AIDS patient . . . When we received the CAT scans, we discovered that the patient was named Messiah. At that moment, we knew that the sculpture had to be in the shape of a crucifix. We decided to focus on hope, chance, and death as the sub-themes of the work. The face of death is cast in glass, the hand of hope is a piece of found folk art found from Wisconsin. The dice are animated, and the AIDS virus is a scientific visualization model based on information available in 1989.
hope
From Media to Metaphor: Art About AIDS, a traveling exhibition organized and circulated by ICI, Independent Curators Incorporated, New York, NY, made possible, in part, by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts and contributions from the ICI Exhibition Patrons Circle.
Hope, 1987 (detail)
Ellen Sandor & (art)n: Randy Johnson, Jim Zanzi, and Stephan Meyers
Dan Sandin, Electronic Visualization Lab, University of Illinois at Chicago
Special thanks to Dr. Roberta Glick, M.D.
PHSCologram: Chromalin, Kodalith and Plexiglas
24 x 20 inches
chance
"A new work about the ravages and cultural consequences of AIDS, ... aesthetic equivalents of sophisticated war games that compute iteration after iteration of our plausible doom."
- PHSColograms: New Universes, New Aesthetic Focuses, Michel Segard
Chance, 1987 (detail)
Ellen Sandor & (art)n: Randy Johnson, Jim Zanzi, and Stephan Meyers
Dan Sandin, Electronic Visualization Lab, University of Illinois at Chicago
Special thanks to Dr. Roberta Glick, M.D.
PHSCologram: Chromalin, Kodalith and Plexiglas
24 x 20 inches
death
"Sculptor Randy Johnson and Professor Jim Zanzi worked on PHSCologram metaphors called Hope, Chance, and Death. All of the pieces were assembled into a large-scale sculptural cross. Thanks to SAIC adjunct associate professor Lisa Stone, each PHSCologram of Messiah included the real patient’s CT scan in the background."
Death, 1987 (detail)
Ellen Sandor & (art)n: Randy Johnson, Jim Zanzi, and Stephan Meyers
Dan Sandin, Electronic Visualization Lab, University of Illinois at Chicago
Special thanks to Dr. Roberta Glick, M.D.
PHSCologram: Chromalin, Kodalith and Plexiglas
24 x 20 inches
"In its glowing free-standing cross, "Messiah" the Chicago-based collective (art)n converts images of a brain scan into colored holograms, making an unusually impressive use of this often hokey medium."
- Roberta Smith, "Response to AIDS Gains in Subtlety," The New York Times, 1994
"Electrifying"
- Bill Homisak, Tribune