FLUX
Imagining a future where we will be able to connect with nature, witnessing its presence and feeling part of a larger biotic community.
Monitoring in the bush the pale green polyester canvas, organically dotted and covered by a layer of Eucalyptus leaves and organic matter (detail)
White-spotted swift spider (Nyssus albopunctatus) hunting onto the brown polyester bio canvas and leaf litter (detail)
Pollinator native boatman fly (Pogonortalis doclea) resting on the biocanvas. It is named for its habit of moving its wings in a rowing motion (extract)
Bioart multimedia installation
In Flux (2024) Ferracin collaborates with naturally occurring and hybridized materiality to enhance ecological connectivity and biodiversity awareness. She first seeks permission from the bush as a respectful ritual.
The artwork evidences the flows of living matter over a two-year period, growing onto four man-made waterproof polyester canvases left in the wild, an intimate exchange between the artist’s experimental process and its organic material agency. Ferracin has let time to slow down the process and allow the weather exposure, the passage of animals, insects and organic matter to do the rest.
The result is an alchemic and fertile substrate of marks, imprints, multi strata of dust and leaves, organic matter, decolouration, mushroom mycelium and roots which reveal the invisible and restless adaptation to the change by the local biodiversity and its ecosystem.
In the gallery, videos, photos and the native habitat’s recorded sound combined with the artist- improvised chanting, immerse the participants into a rhythmic sequence of intimate and cycle-time experiences.
The appearance and disappearance of the four canvases alternates local biodiversity to micro-organic interventions in collaboration with micro-macro organisms living between the soil surface and the fabrics.
The final canvases’ extraction, combined with the artist’s ritualistic chanting, marks the end of the overall experimental process and the beginning of a renewed attitude mindful of the native habitat’s agency and its delicate equilibrium.
Artwork details
| Artwork | Flux (2024) |
| Material | Mixed media |
| Dimensions | Variable – entrance space, 1 gallery projection room |
| Duration video | each video 3:00 mins (loop) |
| Exhibition |
Hope is the thing with Feathers
Chrissie Cotter Gallery, Inner West Council, Camperdown, NSW 31 October - 10 November 2024 |
| Links | Inner West Council |
Credits
Voice and Field recording
Marta Ferracin
Chime sculpture
Christopher Verheyden
Activation design Raspberry PI
Chris Daniel
Photos
Christopher Verheyden; courtesy of the visitor
Provision of Chrissie Cotter Gallery
Inner West Council
© Marta Ferracin 2025 Website by Natalia
Installation assistant Christopher Verheyden