Matter in Motion and the Mysticism of Nature’s Colour

Jeanette Scharing,

With contributions by Pooja Kaul, Heather I Sullivan, Ingmar Meland, Ida Bencke, Jonas Bergquist Froeydi Laszlo (ed) and Frida Arnqvist Engstroem (Engstroem’s essay is in Swedish)

In the book Matter in Motion and the Mysticism of Nature’s Colour we are presented to a unique body of work, combining traditional knowledge of dyeing with plants, environmentalism and contemporary artistic research. By foregrounding the processual character of natures colours rather than focusing on the practical uses of pigments and fibres, Scharing opens her work to a contemporary discussion involving new-materialist thinking, theories of consciousness, language and interspecies communication as well as ethical reflections on gender, human rights and just sharing of the worlds resourches. In Scharing’s art the colours produced through the complex interaction of plants, water and bacterial fermentation becomes a language indicating both water quality, bacterial activity and how the plant has been growing, thereby translating a kind of Earthly fundamental language to our human perception.

The book is the second issue of the 284 Publishers series Co/Co-, Coevolution Concept. The aim of the series is to broaden our perspectives about living on Earth and discuss it as a continual practice of co-habiting and co-involving as part of a multi-species network. Jeanette Scharings book is the first book in the series to acknowledge the multi-layered importance of relating to plants, and as such rise philosophical questions even about the nature of light and distribution of clean water.