Kombucha

Nymphenproject

Artist, dancer, choreographer Gloria Dorliguzzo dedicates her work to continuous artistic/performative research. Through the skin generated by the kombucha’s scoby that protects itself from external aggressions (like the human skin), the artist creates performances focused on the use of this membrane to generate and nurture a study of skin as an organ connected with life, transformation and death.

Making process

Nymphenproject has so far had 3 steps in which the skin(membrane produced by the scoby) and the human body were protagonists and analysed according to the three processes of life: birth, transformation and death.
For each experimentation and performance, it took over 1.75m (height of a human being) containing tanks to create large dimensions of Skin that will later interact with the body during the performance. The process starts with finding a place that can fit a containing tub(s). Then follows the preparation of kombucha according to the recipe with black tea, sugar and scoby with its starter liquid. The tanks normally hold from 300 litres up. Once the liquid has been prepared and poured into the tanks, they are covered with a white cotton sheet and left to stand for at least 30 days. The more time passes, the thicker and stronger the skin becomes. The ph of the liquid is checked once a week; the ideal is 4.0 and should not exceed 5.0.

Text submitted by the maker and edited by the Future Materials Bank. For information about reproducing (a part of) this text, please contact the maker.