Xuanyi Zhang

Bacteria has the following characteristics:

1. Invisible but vital;
2. Unpredictable and unknown;
3. No intervene;

Findings:

1. All samples taken from Richmond, Westminster, Greenwich, and Sheerness, grow similar colonies of bacteria;
2. More colonies of bacteria can grow in downstream water;
3. Evian is relatively clean in terms of bacteria;
4. Salicylic acid largely kills bacteria to grow;
5. Some sites (Westminster) have special kinds of bacteria;

Reflections and Interpretations:

1. Petri dishes as a medium – We plant, observe, manipulate, interpret, and eventually kill bacteria in a petri dish. Through petri dishes, the technical object, we see what was unseen without it, and what was left by bacteria and time.
2. Distributed Metaphor of Bacteria – There is no central hub for colonies of bacteria, each bacteria repulicate itself in a binary fission manner, and each of them has a full DNA. More importantly, some colonies of baceria are linking themselves autonomously, like a rhizome.
3. Remote ways of seeing – We are equipped with fully manoeuvrable digitalised eyes, the online maps and street views, enabling us to see there without being there. This kind of eye is even more versatile than our actual eyes.

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