Falmouth/Exeter Creative Exchange Workshops
Mapping Emergence + Making Kin With Soil
Artist-researchers discuss their collaborations with ants and soil - and invite the public to engage with their creative process.
| An Environment and Sustainability Institute research event | |
|---|---|
| Date | 19 July 2023 |
| Time | 12:00 to 14:00 |
| Place | Environment and Sustainability Institute |
| Provider | Environment and Sustainability Institute |
Event details
As part of their FXCE pilot project, University of Exeter Research Fellow, Dr Thomas O’Shea-Wheller, and Falmouth University Lecturer in Photography, Dr Catarina Fontoura, have been investigating creativity, collective intelligence, and self-organisation in ant colonies. On July 19 Catarina and Thomas will share the work they have been doing together in a talk and workshop at the Environment and Sustainability Institute, in conversation with invited guest artist Iman Datoo.
The Mapping Emergence project has seen Catarina and Thomas conduct fieldwork across locations in Cornwall (including the Eden Project), utilising sugar solution and non-toxic ink to create art with ants in their natural habitats. By mapping the indexical traces that these insects leave, their work aims to explore individuality and heterogeneity, while considering the relationship between humans and animals in the context of creativity. Catarina and Thomas will give a talk outlining the project’s development thus far and reflect upon its future legacy and impact.
Artist Iman Datoo will introduce her residency with the University of Exeter and the Eden Project, titled Making Kin With Soil. Iman is working with Exeter and Eden Project researchers to explore how regenerative storytelling can create common and shared grammars for reanimating soils and communicating their inhabitants’ sentience and liveliness. She is particularly interested in exploring intimacy as a resource within scientific practice, drawing on cultural entanglements with the non-human to inform new ways of organising and knowledge-making.
After the talks, participants will have the opportunity to engage with ants and soil directly, at a live ant foraging station (weather permitting) and a soil-mapping display in the ESI.
Please note:
- This event is open to public but registration is required.
- Lunch will be provided at 12 noon.
- Registration for this event ends by midnight 17 July.
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Location:
Environment and Sustainability Institute
