coral forms

Spiderweb

unusual commercially used textiles

Soy Silk fibre contains natural anti-bacterial agents which can restrain the growth of certain types of bacteria and is therefore considered a very sanitary fiber
Sting Plus nettle fabric is woven from the stinging nettle, which "produces a uniquely strong, soft and naturally fire retardant textile fibre" and, blended with pure new wool, it is "the ultimate environmental upholstery solution."
Lenpur is a biodegradable fabric made from white pine tree clippings, and "offers the comfort of silk, the touch of cashmere and the lightness of linen."
Seacell is a fabric made out of Lyocell (a 100% wood pulp fiber) and seaweed. The theory is that your skin will absorb nutrients from the seaweed, which is quite mineral- and vitamin-rich

Herbarium

In botany, a herbarium (plural: herbaria) – sometimes known by the Anglicized term herbar – is a collection of preserved plantspecimens. These specimens may be whole plants or plant parts: these will usually be in a dried form, mounted on a sheet, but depending upon the material may also be kept in alcohol or other preservative. The same term is often used in mycology to describe an equivalent collection of preserved fungi, otherwise known as a fungarium.

Louise Bourgeois' Spiders

In her art, women became houses, mothers became spiders, and spiders hung around "the doorways of the years" like prostitutes. In one sculpture, she portrayed her husband, the art historian Robert Goldwater, as a vulnerable, almost feminine head emerging from a writhing nest of flopping penises – she wanted to make him sexy, she said; and she also produced a costume bulging with rows of breasts, to be worn by a man. We are all vulnerable, and all male-female, she said.

Hubert Duprat

Duprat's aquatic caddis fly larvae, with cases incorporating gold, opal, and turquoise, among other materials.

The images above illustrate the results of an unusual artistic collaboration between the French artist Hubert Duprat and a group of caddis fly larvae. A small winged insect belonging to the order Trichoptera and closely related to the butterfly, caddis flies live near streams and ponds and produce aquatic larvae that protect their developing bodies by manufacturing shea ths, or cases, spun from silk and incorporating substances—grains of sand, particles of mineral or plant material, bits of fish bone or crustacean shell—readily available in their benthic ecosystem. The larvae are remarkably adaptable: if other suitable materials are introduced into their environment, they will often incorporate those as well.

Duprat, who was born in 1957, began working with caddis fly larvae in the early 1980s. An avid naturalist since childhood, he was aware of the caddis fly in its role as a favored bait for trout fishermen, but his idea for the project depicted here began, he has said, after observing prospectors panning for gold in the Ariège river in southwestern France. After collecting the larvae from their normal environments, he relocates them to his studio where he gently removes their own natural cases and then places them in aquaria that he fills with alternative materials from which they can begin to recreate their protective sheaths. He began with only gold spangles but has since also added the kinds of semi-precious and precious stones (including turquoise, opals, lapis lazuli and coral, as well as pearls, rubies, sapphires, and diamonds) seen here. The insects do not always incorporate all the available materials into their case designs, and certain larvae, Duprat notes, seem to have better facility with some materials than with others. Additionally, cases built by one insect and then discarded when it evolves into its fly state are sometimes recovered by other larvae, who may repurpose it by adding to or altering its size and form.

Duprat traces his work with the caddis fly larvae back to pioneering nineteenth-century entomologists such as François-Jules Pictet and Jean-Henri Fabre, who both conducted experiments in which structure-building insects were given alternative, non-indigenous materials. Seen within the context of the artist's work—a practice that has often addressed aspects of mimesis in the realms of both nature and facture through his conceptual sculptural activities—the caddis fly larvae project is an example of Duprat's ongoing interest in productive collisions between organic forms and technologized materials. Yet the work also provokes broader philosophical questions regarding behavior and intent, one that was summarized particularly astutely by the critic and philosopher Christian Besson, in a conversation with the artist conducted in the late 1990s:

Kant's distinction between works of art and those of nature leaves us in a quandary. The production of the artifact within nature herself poses a problem—even more so when an aesthetic aspect is involved. Whether the insect is a craftsperson or whether, more generally, nature is a creator of forms, the consideration, within nature, of an aesthetic dimension is the stumbling block of science. ...

Your activity as an artist, upsetting the ordinary ethology of the insect, seems to me to be the same thing as introducing a noise, complicating itsumwelt and producing a response. In your diversion of the caddis worm's behavior, in your artistic manipulation, the effect is twofold. From a biological viewpoint, a random event triggers self-organization. From a human viewpoint, the experimenter's intent produces this effect. ...

Is the caddis worm's precious case the work of the insect or the work of the artist? This is not the right question. The contradiction can be resolved by the differing viewpoints. According to the first view, the caddis worm owed nothing to the artist (who is simply the author of one noise among the thousands of other noises in its environment). According to the second view, the caddis worm is merely the executor of the artist's project. The artistic statement plays on the confusion of the two levels by overlaying the two perspectives. The aesthetic result (at once natural and artistic) turns the caddis worm's case—which is more than an assisted ready-made or a diversion—into a doubly exposed object...¹
—Jeffrey Kastner

Yukinori Yanagi

The World Flag Ant Farm (1990)

This piece consists of 170 ant farms, each of which has its sand in the configuration of a nation's flag. Over the course of the exhibition, the ants shift the sand around and build a nest.

Cath Keay

Cath Keay’s doctoral project builds on her previous, long-running work on bees and wax sculpture to investigate ways in which art and the natural world can interact, exploring dynamic natural processes that can influence the final form of a sculpture. Keay’s sculptural works provide a basis for animal colonisation in natural environments (a wax architectural sculpture in a beehive; terracotta text sculptures in the sea); over time it is possible to investigate the way in which these animal forms adapt to and alter the artworks, creating beauty in nature’s response to human intervention. Her work highlights the role of nature as collaborator in the creation of the artistic product.

Keay’s original work on bees and wax sculptures, from which her present projects evolved, reflected on humans and bees as social creatures, within the context of 1930s utopian architecture. By creating an art deco-style wax building and placing it in a hive as a starter structure for bees to use to build wax cells, it was possible to observe how human architecture and bee architecture could merge.
Her present work refers to the vast number of organisms living in the sea that we know nothing about, and the difficulty of preserving sea life for study. The words that Keay chose to place in the sea are ‘fecundity’, ‘feracity’ and ‘uberty’, all variations on the theme of fruitfulness, and the flowing, italic form of the sculptures expresses this theme further. Through this project an interest in Victorian understandings of art and science has also emerged: the use of Victorian tanks at the Newcastle University’s Dove marine laboratory has resulted in her focussing on Ruskin, particularly his crossover interest in art and science and his negative response to Darwinism.
Keay also hopes to develop her work in the future to grow crystals in forms of Utopian architecture.

Coatings

Ana Mendieta

Ana Mendieta (18 November 1948 – 8 September 1985) was a Cuban-American artist famous for her performance art and “earth-body” sculptural, photographic, and video work.

Mendieta’s early approaches to art could be considered revolutionary, even in their roughest forms. She was especially intrigued by challenging the established materials of art – canvas, paint, paper, etc – and instead explored a great range of unused and disregarded materials, such as the human body. The human body had been generally regarded as one of the most important components of artistic works, as a subject. It was Ana who decided to experiment with the human body as a tool for creative expression, where it was not only the objective of the work but also the means of execution itself. The first record of her conscious work as a means of expression is 1973. An incident of rape and murder had occurred on the Iowa campus, and Ana wanted to protest against the campus administration’s approach to the issue (the usual hush-hush approach and, in general, bad PR).

Ana Mendieta’s early artistic experiments (roughly 1972 – 78) involved a lot of cosmetic refinement and elaboration. Challenging both physical expectations as well as throwing subtle hints at gender roles, she would utilise makeup, glass, and sometimes even shampoo to modify her upper body into different and controversial configurations, assuming different personalities and stances throughout her photographed works. Her video experiments are much more theatrical in their span; they feature a symbolic plot and timeline – the life of a particular piece she had conceived.

At the start of 1975 her body-centred art found a new height: the production of the Silueta series, in which she imprints of her own body merged in the landscape. Some critics have drawn parallels between her Siluetas and the early work of feminist artists that sought to re-establish the link between the female form and the Mother Earth figure. Mendieta, however, had a different concept behind her work. She had apparently been fascinated by the concept of ‘Mythical Geology’ as well as the Rupestrian art and it was this that she sought to achieve in her works.

Dyes

Different Plant Dyes:

• Catechu (brown) - from resin(sticky substance that comes from plant) of acacia tree.
• Fustic (yellow) - from the wood of the fustic tree.
• Henna (orange-red) - from leaves of the henna plant.
• Indigo (blue), is from leaves and stems of the indigo plant.
• Logwood (black) - from the core(heart) of the logwood tree.
• Madder (Turkey red) - from the roots of the madder plant.
• Quercitron (yellow) - from the inner bark of the black oak tree.
• Saffron (yellow) - from stigmas of the common crocus.
• Turmeric (violet) - from roots of the turmeric plant.Major Animal Dyes:
  • Cochineal (red) - from bodies of cochineal insects.
  • Tyrian Purple (purple or crimson) - from the bodies of some types of marine snails.
  • Sepia (brown) - from secretions of several types of cuttlefish.

  Mineral Dyes:

  • Chrome Green - from a compound of chromium and oxygen.
  • Chrome Red - from a compound of chromium and lead.
  • Chrome Yellow - from a compound of chromic acid and lead.
  • Prussian Blue - from a compound of iron and cyanide.

  
  

Perito Moreno Glacier

Chankillo, Peru

The Thirteen Towers of Chankillo run from north to south along the ridge of a low hill within the site; they are relatively well-preserved and each has a pair of inset staircases leading to the summit.

The rectangular structures, between 75 and 125 square metres (807-1,345 sq ft) in size, are regularly spaced - forming a "toothed" horizon with narrow gaps at regular intervals.

About 230m (750ft) to the east and west are what scientists believe to be two observation points. From these vantages, the 300m- (1,000ft-) long spread of the towers along the horizon corresponds very closely to the rising and setting positions of the Sun over the year.