Beetroot

By

Made in

Biodegradable 205 Bioplastic 68 Textile 77 Agar agar 17 Beetroot 3 Gelatine 13

Beetroot

Photos: Kevin Koekje, Bram de Groot

Morphling

Morphling is an interactive installation covered by a biodegradable lick-able skin that breathes, smells, moves and ages. The main ingredient of Morphling’s skin are five hundred beetroots, harvested from Dutch farmlands.

Morphling invites you on an inverted space expedition of our bodies. Magnifying the galaxy we inhabit, Katrijn sees our bodies less as shells and more as constellations of microbial life. Performing bodies continuously inhabit the installation interacting with Morpling’s ‘microbial constellation’. Each of the inhabitants brings a different character of movement to the work.

Morphling animates us to reimagine our bodies as interconnected systems which are able to encapsulate other matter or beings. Blurring the boundaries between inside and outside, self and other, it invites us to discover ourselves not as one but as many.

Additional information

After the harvest, the beetroots are sliced and dried for several hours. Once the drying process is finished, the beetroots are ground into a fine powder.
Together with the rest of the ingredients (listed below) the powder is mixed into a paste. Then, layer by layer, the paste is thinly spread onto a fabric canvas. When dry, these layers can be pulled from the canvas and Morphling’s skin is formed.

Ready to try it’s sweet earthy taste?

Information submitted by the maker and edited by the Future Materials Bank.

Ingredients

Beetroot, agar agar, water, clove, vitamin e, gelatin

Credits

Performers: Analu Fretta, Andrea van der Kuil, Kadri Sirel, Faeryn van den Berg, Hannah Vrijenhoek, Bo Kuiper, Jara de Nijs, Ischa Heijnen, Maria Pérez-Lozao