In the late 1990s at Carnegie Mellon University, Faith Wilding organized an on-campus reading group that discussed digital culture and technologies, feminisms, postcolonial theory, body- and bio-politics, and reproductive health.
[1] It was from this reading group in 1998 that the cyberfeminist collective subRosa formed, with founding members María Fernández, Wilding, Hyla Willis, and Michelle M.
Other participants in the reading group at Carnegie Mellon (and at different points, members of subRosa) include Emily de Araujo, Krista Connerly, Steffi Domike, Camilla Griggers, Christina Hung, Carolina Loyola, Laleh Mehran, Elizabeth Monoian, Ann Rosenthal, Suzie Silver, Lucia Sommer, and Rebecca Vaughan.
subRosa is a reproducible cyberfeminist cell of cultural researchers committed to combining art, activism, and politics to explore and critique the effects of the intersections of the new information and biotechnologies on women's bodies, lives, and work.
Since its founding in 1998, subRosa has developed situated, trans-disciplinary, performative, and discursive practices that create open-ended environments where participants engage with objects, texts, digital technologies, and critical learning experiences interacting with each other and the artists.
[13] SmartMom is a form of appropriation, presented as a promotional website, that critiques the Smart T-shirt, a military technology that surveils soldiers’ bodies for medical purposes.
[16] Members of subRosa posed as corporate salespeople and government representatives and organized the participants into cohorts to deliver presentations on reproductive health and technologies using accessible language.
[18] Expo EmmaGenics was an installation and performance organized as a tradeshow, where subRosa members presented satirical products from the biotech industry that enhance fertility.
[25] Technology and design specialists Mary Flanagan and Suyin Looui conceptualize subRosa’s activist art as a modality to visualize and critique data informed by body politics.