On mycohuman performances: fungi in current artistic research

This review reflects several artists and their artistic research in the field of hybrid art, bio art, or science art, working with Fungi as both subject matter and medium. The work of Saša Spačal, Tarsh Bates and Theresa Schubert is not representational in the manner of traditional fine art, but works rather through performative, multidisciplinary and research-based strategies to produce artwork through fungal material as such. My research results are based on the series “Nonhuman subjectivities” and “Nonhuman agents” that Christian de Lutz and I conceived and realized at Art Laboratory Berlin (2016–18) in various formats—exhibitions, workshops, lectures and a conference. The work of Saša Spačal and her colleagues involves creating interactive situations of symbiosis between the fungal and the human. An example of this is Myconnect, in which a biofeedback loop is related between the human participant and Oyster mushroom mycelia through a special encounter, which is mediated by non-linguistic forms of awareness and exchange—sonic, electronic and metabolic. Tarsh Bates’ work with Candida albicans and Candida parapsilosis refers to a complex and intimate relation between the human and yeasts that form part of the human microbiome. Bates considers the relationship between humans and yeast as “CandidaHomo Ecologies” and sees both partners as equals. She explores this relationship through her work The Surface dynamics of adhesion, examines it from historical and metabolic levels through an installation that includes the live yeast growing on agar mixed with the artist’s own blood. Theresa Schubert’s installations and site-specific interventions treat living organisms, especially Fungi, as collaborators and co-creators. Her work Growing Geometries—Tattooing Mushrooms follows the morphological development of fungal fruiting bodies through the intervention of a tattoo. Her performative forest walks, especially the Forestal Psyche and also new actions for the “Mind the Fungi” project, engage the public in an intimate and multi sensory encounter with Fungi and their surrounding environment.