Fermenting Textiles – Weaving Together Traditional Craft, Anthropology, Microbiology and Art

»Fermenting Textiles« is a unique transdisciplinary research and exhibition project that puts active matter at the center: it connects anthropology, microbiology, and art through the engagement of artisans, anthropologists, scientists, and artists, as well as more-than-human actors. »Fermenting Textiles« explores the fermentation of textiles in mud and plant material to produce complex dyeing for various uses – from traditional hunter shirts in Burkina Faso to kimono silk dyeing in Japan. In each case, the process is artisanal and has fascinating traditional uses and meanings. Both cases make use of natural chemical and biological processes to create unique aesthetic and medicinal results.

Cross-cultural research methods also play a key role in »Fermenting Textiles«. Anthropologist Laurence Douny has worked with dyers in Burkina Faso to meticulously document the long Vouwo mud dyeing process, which involves soil of different origins, iron ore, and various plant materials. Microbiologist Regine Hengge and her PhD student José I. Hernández Lobato have studied the complex interactions of soil bacteria with plants and fabrics in the dyeing process and will visually re-enact these in the exhibition. Furthermore, Hengge reaches across fields by photographically creating patterns that combine images of bacterial biofilms from this scientific research and of the West African textiles studied by Douny. These have been printed on fabrics for making new shirts, thus completing a transdisciplinary journey from »shirt to shirt«.

The art and design project »Craft Portrait: Dorozome« by Pauline Agustoni and Satomi Minoshima explores fabric dyeing by artisans on the southern Japanese island of Amami Oshima. Traditionally, silk threads for kimono production, interwoven with cotton threads, which are later removed to reveal undyed portions of textile, are initially dyed in a liquid bath of tree bark before being repeatedly dipped in mud. This causes chemical reactions of complexation and oxidation, which create rich, dark brown and black silks. While working with the artisans in Japan, Agustoni and Minoshima have also produced a textile sculpture of pink-brown and black strands that twist and turn, emulating the act of wringing, an essential part of the dyeing process.

By combining these approaches, methods, and contexts, »Fermenting Textiles« stresses the agency and sentience of matter in the fermentation process and its versatile materiality. Speaking through the lens of Posthuman philosophy, matter actively performs what philosopher Karen Barad describes as »a materialist, naturalist, and posthumanist elaboration – that allows matter its due as an active participant in the world’s becoming, in its ongoing ›intra-activity‹« (Barad 2003). The unique multi-national, multi- and trans-disciplinary cooperation that makes up the group exhibition »Fermenting Textiles« mirrors the multi-species collaborations that are integral to the mud dyeing process.
Regine Rapp & Christian de Lutz

Credits

»Fermenting Textiles« is a collaboration between the Cluster of Excellence »Matters of Activity« at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin and Art Laboratory Berlin.

Team Credits

Exhibition Curation: Regine Rapp & Christian de Lutz, Art Laboratory Berlin
Research Project Management: Regine Hengge & Laurence Douny
Research Project Collaboration: José I. Hernández Lobato, Adama Séré, Salif Sawadogo

Dates

Vernissage: Fri, 16 May 2025, 8:00–11:00 pm
Exhibition: 17 May–6 July 2025
Opening Hours: Thu–Sun, 2:00–6:00 pm

Free Entrance

Accompanying Program

Sun, 18 May 2025, 3:00-4:30 pm
Exhibition Talk
Pauline Agustoni & Satomi Minoshima

Sun, 15 June 2025, 3:00-4:30 pm
Exhibition Talk
Regine Hengge & Laurence Douny

More Information
https://artlaboratory-berlin.org/exhibitions/fermenting-textiles/
https://www.matters-of-activity.de/en/posts/16004/fermenting-textiles