Pomological: Poison Apples and Fallen Fruit
Presented by the Biomaterials Working Group in Partnership with The Philadelphia Orchard Project
Sunday October 27th, LOCATION TBD, 11:30-2pm
We are eating apples in the end of times. Through discussion and production of fruit leather from salvaged fallen apples, this workshop ruminates on apples in mythical, cultural, and biological contexts.Apple leather is presented in simultaneous processing stages: cooking, dehydrating, and as a bioplastic material within art practices.
This workshop explores apples as symbols of knowledge, tickets to (un)paradise, fairy tale poisons and folk remedies, and sci-fi symbionts, grafted from clones. This seemingly simple, homely fruit unfolds into complex layers – how do we parse inherited stories around sustenance, medicine, and colonial forestry? Through food preservation, what future are we planning?
About the Artists:
The Biomaterials Working Group (BWG), is an arts research collective based in the part of Lenapehoking called Philadelphia. BWG members include Marcellus Armstrong, Jazmyn Crosby, Theo Loftis, Cecilia McKinnon, and Elizabeth Shores. As artists, educators, and researchers, we share an interest in exploring sustainable alternatives to plastics and toxic materials conventionally used in studio art practices, as well as a broad curiosity about the transformative potential of everyday materials used in unconventional ways. Our various previous avenues of exploration include: algae-based bioplastics, eggshell concrete, fermentation, natural pigments, kombucha leather, saltwater radio antennae, and more.
