unborn0X9

Future Baby Production is an initiative by Shu Lea Cheang and Ewen Chardronnet. In 2016 the echOpen fablab of Hôtel-Dieu hospital in Paris, an open and collaborative project and community fablab with the aim of designing a functional low-cost and open source echo-stethoscope (portable ultrasound device), invited the two artists/authors to collaborate and contribute to the community project through artistic practice and skills. This opportunity led to the UNBORN0X9 project.

Soon a large team of interested artists and cultural facilitators joined the initiative and started working on the various dimensions of the hacking performance project. The Future Baby Production collective name represents the common group effort to raise issues such as the possible impact of low cost echo-stethoscopy on Global Health issues, questions of access to healthcare and motherhood, ectogenesis and the technicization of reproduction, and the back-and-forth between science-fiction imaginary and science in the making at large.