ARTS AND BIOETHICS NETWORK

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Coordinator: Rosa Wijnen MSc (University of Amsterdam)

Currently enrolled: Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam.

email address: rosavan2000@gmail.com

Co-Coordinator: Paul Macneill MA, LLB, PhD
(Honorary) Associate Professor

Sydney Health Ethics

School of Public Health

University of Sydney

AUSTRALIA

Goals. The aim of this network is to increase the contribution of the arts to bioethics. It is our belief that the arts enrich bioethical discourse and open up new creative approaches on bioethical issues. Bioethical issues such as cloning, genetic engineering have been the subject of theatre, drama, dance, books and movies. An artistic exploration of these issues has captured the public imagination in various ways. Fiction, drama, movies and alternative expressions reframe and conceptualize issues and influence public perception and understanding in powerful ways. Recognizing a contribution from the arts opens a wider avenue to contributions from many cultures. This network will stimulate artistic explorations into culture and bioethics through the initiation of interdisciplinary dialogue between the textual and the non-textual, and between cultures. The network has four aims:

· To promote critical engagement between artists and non-artists

· To encourage and facilitate the publication of scholarly articles in journals, on arts-bioethics issues

· To serve as a forum for reporting of arts events which explore bioethics issues

· To engage in dialogue through personal experiences in artistic explorations

· To engage with other IAB networks on the artistic exploration into their focus themes

Launch of The Arts and Bioethics Network. The Arts and Bioethics Network was launched at the 9th World Congress of Bioethics, in September 2008 in Rijeka, Croatia with The Art of Bioethics Exhibition, an Arts Bioethics Performance, a movie, and several academic papers.

Activity of the Arts & Bioethics Network 

Members of the Arts and Bioethics Network met, gave presentations, and supported exhibitions and performances in:

• Rijeka,      Croatia 2008 (as above)
• Singapore      2020, 
• Rotterdam      2012, and 
• Edinburg      2016: where there was a parallel ‘Arts and Ethics programs’, presentations,      and performances. There was also a meeting of the Edinburgh Arts & Ethics      Research Group on ‘The Transformative Potential of the Arts’.

There were no Arts and Bioethics meetings or presentations in 2020 in Philadelphia, nor in the Basel, Switzerland 2022 hybrid meeting.