Collection of lichen on sculpted rocks
2023
Lichen Timescapes is a collection of living sculptures. Gathered through multiple hiking trips in Mexico, Italy, Ireland and Portugal, it highlights the intricate and timeless relationships between species. The rocks are inhabited by lichen, complex organisms consisting of at least three diverse kingdoms – bacteria, fungi, and algae. These species come together in a symbiotic relationship, protecting and feeding each other, becoming one new organism with scientific names and qualities.
These trans-species relationships are slow, maybe 2 millimetres per year, depending on the species and condition. They are also crustose, incrusted and inseparable from the multi-million-year-old rock or fossilized wood. This geological object is also impacted by human erosion, sculpting as an emphasis of the lichenous forms and geological specificities of the mineral. The sculpting also highlights human time within biological and geological scales, placing our timescales in perspective.
Limestone
Six million-year-old, Miocene
Rhizocarpon geographicum (the map lichen)
Campo Imperatore, Abruzzo, Italy.
