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Artist Statement

The modern science of conservation and interpretation to be secured and maintained. The protection of this is required to attract mycelium and algae from the water. sources consulted
of ruins seeks to avoid their destruction by vegetation, and other such colonial structures become not only The control is a concrete mixture made with a typical Dentith, M. 2014. “The Philosophy of Conspiracy Theories.” Basingstoke:
because in that context, they are seen as agents of the protection of the structures, but of its fortifying, concrete ratio (1 part cement, 3 parts aggregate, 3 parts Palgrave Mcmillan.
destruction (Dwyer, 2009). The design proposition leans territorializing, and dispossessing paradigms as well. sand), the aggregate is substituted with cellulose fibre Dwyer, John. “Ruins and the Embrace of Nature.” Australian Garden History
into that destruction, and prioritizes revegetation through A myth as a design is proposed due to how it like psyllium husk or sterilized leaves (which provides 21, no. 2 (2009): 10–14. https://www.jstor.org/stable/24919165.
a creation myth that maps the below and above sea works together with existing social beliefs to produce food for the mycelium), and the sand is substituted with Hartman, Saidiya. 2008. “Venus In Two Acts”. Small Axe: A Caribbean
level conditions of the site of the 1794 Mozambiquan alternate versions of reality (and the future) powerful brown rice flour. The potential that using leaves presents Journal Of Criticism 12 (2): 1-14. doi:10.1215/-12-2-1.
shipwreck of the Sao Jose Paquette de Africa, off the enough to override the current present (Dentith, 2014). is using plant material that is present at the existing
coast of Clifton 4th Beach in Cape Town (Cooper, 2015). The creation myth makes use of Saidiya Hartman’s site of the chapel to contextualize the experiment. The
The work proposes a 4th passage (as an extension of Critical Fabulation (Hartman, 2008) to make sense experiment is presented as a series of scale models that
the 1st, 2nd/Middle and 3rd passages), through which of the orchestrated absences in the archive of the is accompanied by footage of the process. Thereafter,
the ship’s drowned child slaves make their journey back shipwreck. These formulations are then simulated the ratios of each concrete mixture are adjusted and the
home to the Island of Mozambique where they were through both sandplay and performance. cellulose fibre substitute changed in order to find the ideal
abducted from, so that their uprooted souls may finally Mycelium is used to model the projected mixture. The liquid culture that the models are partially
rest. The passage culminates with the drowned child growth of algal bloom in the Endless Waters, as well submerged in, which models the ocean water, is a
slaves (whose spirits take on the physical form of algal as the passage that the algal bloom drifts along on the mixture of honey and water (3% honey). The liquid culture
bloom) feasting on the Chapel of Nossa Senhora de surface of the ocean, and the eventual colonization of provides a good liquid medium for the mycelium cultures
Baluarte at the Fort of Sao Sebastio, which was built in the ruin. Mycelium is used as a worldbuilding and spatial to grow in. The aim of the experiment is to create a new
1522, and is said to be the oldest colonial structure in the modelling tool due to its symbiotic and overlapping kind of concrete that attracts fungi, in order to determine
Southern Hemisphere. characteristics with algae, and the colonization of the what degenerative effects the fungi has on the concrete,
The Chapel of Nossa Senhora de Baluarte is ruin by the algae is fantasized as it “returning to the as well as the worldbuilding capacity of the experiments
protected both from demolition and the natural process earth, melting back into the landscape” (Dwyer, 2009). as tools of storytelling and performance.
of decay, and is required by the Law of the Protection Part one of my exhibition is a series of
of the Mozambiquan Cultural Patrimony (Law No. 10/88) experiments that reveal what composition of concrete Forts of Sand: Reimagining the Aesthetics of Demolition
through Worldbuilding.
Length 152mm / height 83mm / width 102mm.
Mycelium, honey liquid culture, cement, brown rice flour, and
psyllium husk or grass.
September 2022.
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