Res Artis Conference 2024 — TAIPEI

Interweave the Spectrum: Beyond Collaboration

06 – 09 September 2024

The Termites Studio: In Cohabitation with Other Species

 

“In Cohabitation with Other Species” is a community engaged art project by The Termites Studio on Shodo Island (Seto Inland Sea, Japan). As artists, sailors, farmers, educators, parents and more we work with termites in collaborative ways seeking kinship with other living members of the ecosystems we inhabit. Building upon the nourishement of artists living on Shodoshima includuing painter Enokura Shogo (1901-1977), designer Yoshiaki Kawata and multimedia artist Kana Ko (1975-2020); artists James Jack and Masashi Echigo chose to reside as members of the island community after participating in the artist-in-residence program (2009-2015) held on Mito Penninsula. Together with diverse human and more than human collaborators, they now grow shared ideas drawing from the methods whereby termites build nests in complex and collective ways.

We have identified three creative possibilities based on kinship patterns of termites from which humans can learn. First, the potential for forming communities that live together and support each other through endosymbiotic methods. Second, the creative potential found in seasonal digestive behaviors that imbibe natural, artificial and new materials. And third, the possibility of termites, which are widely distributed in not only the Seto Inland Sea region but also tropical island climates, becoming a shared language for connecting more than human dialogues on Shodo Island with other islands particularly in Asia Pacific. Our current focus is on hosting artists-in-residence and assembling a community archive of sensory experiences. Our work aims to nurture a creative nests whereby parents, plants, children, seaweed, insects and more may gain deeper senses of interconnection. Through continued interactions with more than human kin, we hope interspecies relationships will grow on Shodos Island together with an archipelagic network of other islands for many seasons to come.

 

The 2024 Res Artis conference titled Interweave the Spectrum: Beyond Collaboration will be organized by the Taipei｜Treasure Hill Artist Village under the Taipei Culture Foundation and co-organized by the Taiwan Art Space Alliance held in Taipei from 6 – 9 September 2024. The conference is supported by the Department of Cultural Affairs, Taipei City Government.

https://resartis.org/taipei-2024/