How can technology transform the human body? - Lucy McRae

[Music] [Applause]

I call myself a body architect. I trained in Classical Ballet and have a background in architecture and fashion. As a body architect, I am fascinated with the human body and explore how I can transform it. I worked at Philips Electronics in the far future design research lab, looking 20 years into the future. I explored the human skin and how technology can transform the body.

I worked on concepts like an electronic tattoo, which is augmented by touch, or dresses that blushed and shivered with light. I started my own experiments; these were the low-tech approaches of the high-tech conversations I was having. These are Q-tips stuck to my roommate with wig glue.

I started a collaboration with a friend of mine, Bart Hess. He doesn't normally look like this, and we used ourselves as models. We transformed our apartments into our laboratories and worked in a very spontaneous and immediate way. We were creating visual imagery, provoking human evolution.

Whilst I was at Philips, we discussed this idea of a maybe technology; something that wasn't either switched on or off but in between—a maybe that could take the form of like a gas or a liquid. I became obsessed with this idea of blurring the perimeter of the body, so you couldn't see where the skin ended and the near environment started.

I set up my studio in the red light district and obsessively wrapped myself in plumbing tubing. I found a way to redefine the skin and create this dynamic textile. I was introduced to Robin, the Swedish pop star, and she was also exploring how technology coexists with raw human emotion.

She talked about how technology, with these new feathers and this new face paint, is punk—the way that we identify with the world. We made this music video. I'm fascinated with the idea of what happens when you merge biology with technology.

I remember reading about this idea of being able to reprogram biology in the future, away from disease and aging. I thought about this concept: imagine if we could reprogram our own body odor, modify it biologically, enhance it. How would that change the way we communicate with each other or the way we attract sexual partners? Would we revert back to being more like animals, more primal modes of communication?

I worked with a synthetic biologist and created a swallowable perfume, which is a cosmetic pill that you eat. The fragrance comes out through the skin surface when you perspire. It completely blows apart the way that perfume is and provides a whole new format—it's perfume coming from the inside out. It redefines the role of skin, and our bodies become an atomizer.

I've learned that there are no boundaries, and if I look at the evolution of my work, I can see threads and connections that make sense. But when I look towards the future—the next project—it's completely unknown and wide open.

I feel like I have all these ideas existing, embedded inside of me, and it's these conversations and these experiences that connect these ideas. They kind of instinctively come out. As a body architect, I've created this limitless and boundless platform for me to discover whatever I want, and I feel like I've just got started.

So here's to another day at the office. Thank you. Thank you.