Exhibition: Green Open Food Evolution at Mondes Multiples Festival

Exhibition from November 19 to December 4, 2022, of the « Green Open Food Evolution » installation and the Homo Photosyntheticus knowledge base at the Mondes Multiples Festival, Antre Peaux contemporary art center, Bourges, France.

In 2022, the Multiple World-s Festival is constructed from a work selection from the artists residence deployed in Europe thanks to a sprawling program: “EMAP” (European Media Art Platform - emare.eu). It is enriched from a network of relationships built with other artists, authors, and collective creations.

New senses emerge.

Installation: Green Open Food Evolution

Artist: Maya Minder

Co-designer of the work : Ewen Chardronnet, Gabriel Violleau – Bientôt, architectes urbanismes, Victor Yvin & Pacôme Gérard designers artisans

Construction : Victor Yvin & Pacôme Gérard designers artisans

Activation : Ewen Chardronnet, Maya Minder, Alexia Venot

Produced with the support of the Centre-Val de Loire Region and the More-Than-Planet program co-funded by the European Union

Cyanobacteria, with their ability to photosynthesize and exhale oxygen into our atmosphere, are responsible for what is known as the Great Oxygenation Event of the Cambrian Period, which caused the first extinction mass on planet Earth. As we observe the acceleration of the Holocene extinction due to human activity, the question arises of whether and how life on planet Earth will continue to evolve.

We humans have lived in evolutionary symbiosis with our instestinal bacteria. We communicate with our environment using our non-human allies through food and ingestion. For example, in Japan, lateral gene transfer has occurred within the population’s microbiome, due to the ancient tradition of seaweed consumption. What would become of us if we only ate algae and tried to co-evolve with these alien species from the protista kingdom? Keeping in mind this profound temporality perspective and the more than human multitudes it can draw into a speculative history yet to be written, would it be possible to become fully autotrophic and live as a Homo Photosyntheticus? Green Open Food Evolution embarks on this journey by incorporating design, performance, biohacking and cooking into an installation and a film which are intended to be open and procedural.

Green Open Food Evolution as a media kitchen lab, questions how biohacking can take into account Lynn Margulis' evolutionary biology, molecular transformation through culinary, transdisciplinary approach via new media, performance and life itself to activate an architectural structure. "Cooking therefore transforms us" is the starting point of the practice of Maya Minder which presents the entanglement of food and the act of eating as a holistic approach to transformation, progression, which can mutually promote care, create new symbolism, alchemy and storytelling.