THE INTERDEPENDENT LIVES OF PLANTS: FROM OVID’S MYTHS TO PRESOCRATIC THOUGHT AND BEYOND
Claudia ZATTA is a classicist whose research explores the intersections of ancient Greek literature, philosophy, mythology, and the history of science, with particular emphasis on the relationships between humans, animals, plants and the natural world. She studied at the University of Padua and at Johns Hopkins University (PhD in Classics), was a member of the American College of Greece, is a member of the Institute of Hellenic Culture and Liberal Arts (IHCLA), and is a regular lecturer at Northwestern University. She is the author of numerous scholarly articles and several books, including Interconnectedness: The Living World of the Early Greek Philosophers (Academia Verlag, 2017) and Aristotle and the Animals: The Logos of Life Itself (Routledge, 2022) and a contribution to “L’intelligence des plantes en question” (Hermann, 2020). Her current research focuses on metamorphosis, ecology, and concepts of life in Greco-Roman antiquity. This article translated from the original version in Apeiron for the September issue of Plastir argues that in the Metamorphoses Ovid creatively appropriates aspects of early Greek philosophical thought in his narratives of vegetal transformation. While his poetic universe differs fundamentally from philosophical inquiry in aims and method, Ovid draws upon philosophical conceptions of vegetal life, corporeal analogy, and continuity among living beings in order to explore the boundaries between human and plant existence. Through the dramatic representation of figures transformed into trees, he suspends the moment of metamorphosis between two states of being, creating hybrid entities whose identities and capacities remain open to interpretation. The visible signs of life that persist after transformation—such as the flowing of blood from a tree’s body—further emphasize the continuity between vegetal and animal forms of existence.
CHIMERIC RENATURATION OF LIVING ORGANISMS
Catherine VOISON is an associate professor of fine arts and a visual artist. She holds a PhD in Aesthetics and Art Sciences and is an associate researcher at the ACTE Institute, University of Paris 1 – Panthéon-Sorbonne; she is also an art critic and a member of AICA/France. Her research focuses on ethics, ecological art and technobiological art. Among her recent articles and lectures are: ‘Melancholy in Contemporary Artistic Practices’, 9th International Symposium, Laboratory of Languages, Literatures and Communication, Hassan II University, Casablanca, Morocco (June 2024); ‘The Art of Ai Weiwei: Traces of China’s Memory through the Lens of Past and Present Geopolitical Realities’, University of Strasbourg, symposium ‘Memory Gaps; Traces and Fissures’, University of Strasbourg (Oct. 2023); The Uncertain Ethics of Biotechnological Art Experiments, Ethica Journal, Art and Ethics, vol. 24, no. 1, University of Quebec at Rimouski (Jan. 2022); Biotechnological Art: An Art Form Contaminated by Microbiology, Ligeia Journal Nos. 189–191, ‘Art and Biotechnology’, July–December 2021, pp. 58–75; Ecological Art: An Experimental Art Form in the Service of Humanity, Plastik No. 9, ‘Art and Ecology: Fertile Cross-fertilisation?’ (Sept. 2020). The article she has written for Plastir, followed by a “re-creative” tale in which the author transforms into a passionflower, offers a behind-the-scenes look at the artist’s work and at biology reimagined through the lens of contemporary art. It weaves together fantastical creatures, mutant species, biotechnological art, a unique collection, and a vivid imagination that questions the “seriousness” of the Anthropocene. An ethical and eco-artistic approach that explores life, a kind of living cabinet of curiosities that holds a captivating power for anyone who ponders, even slightly, “this new Age of Enlightenment.”
BIOLOGICAL NETWORKS, MYCELIUM AND DARK MATTER: THE LANGUAGE OF THE COLLECTIVE
David GUEZ is an artist and writer, Pompidou Center, Beaux Arts, Paris. His practice is driven by two key themes: connection and the audience. He explores social relationships, the transitions between media and practices, and the forms of otherness made possible by technology. His work champions art that is open and accessible to all, whilst questioning public and personal freedoms and imagining alternatives. Through objects, installations and experimental frameworks, he engages with free media, science, psychoanalysis, time, identity, collaborative uses of the internet, archiving and the erosion of freedom. His recent projects include Editions L, a workshop on Interstellar Languages (A.L.I.), the collective artificial intelligence E.L.I.OT, the temporal currency KRONOS, the Host an Artist platform and the LEVITATION project, a virtual reality headset connected to the brain. His works are exhibited in France and abroad, notably at the Centre Pompidou, the Jeu de Paume and the Gaîté Lyrique. David Guez presents, for Plastir, an augmented and annotated version of his article on the language of the collective, which he summarises as follows: “A language is not always produced by an individual. It can emerge from a network: roots, mycelium, swarms, colonies, chemical signals, electric fields, flows of information dispersed throughout an environment. On a cosmic scale, dark matter and galaxies also form a web of filaments: the cosmic web. This article proposes to consider A.L.I. from this perspective: what if extraterrestrial intelligence were not a voice, but a network? What if the first interlocutor were not an ‘I’, but a distributed ‘we’?”
THE ‘LISTENING BODY’: BETWEEN VIBRATION, ENERGY AND RESONANCE
Louise BOISCLAIR, PhD, (signature LouB) is a transdisciplinary artist-researcher, painter, essayist, poet and art critic based in Montreal, QC. A member of RAAV, AICA-Canada and CIRET, and the recipient of numerous awards and grants, she combines a strong artistic and writing practice with a rigorous academic background (PhD from UQAM and postdoctoral research at UdeM). Her approach, enriched by forty years of practising tai chi, explores the imagination and the living body through an interwoven pictorial and written language. The author of five essays on immersive art, a collection of poetry (2024), self-published text-image notebooks and art booklets, she theorises the aesthetic experience as a transformative process. Her concept of ‘ecospheric art’ instinctively informs her abstract and organic paintings, which are regularly exhibited, whilst she also contributes to journals such as PLASTIR and the CJLPA. Like a dynamic meditation, this article revisits the questions that emerged between 2017 and 2022 from an in-depth engagement with 22 sound works that form part of La Langue des sons (L’Harmattan 2024). This listening journal offers a dual approach, combining the pen and the brush in sonic experimentation. Scrutinised from every angle, the questions springing from the ‘listening body’ have led to research centred on three omnipresent themes: ‘Energy’, ‘Vibration’ and ‘Resonance’. Who are these beings of light that listening shapes from their intersection? Whether propelled or propelling, does energy act in the singular or the plural: Energy or energies? As listeners or interactors with sound works, what kind of energies are we connected to? Is it sound, frequency, oscillation, a particle or a wave, a ripple, a undulation? Indeed, how can we distinguish between vibrations and resonances? Finally, how does the body receive sound vibrations? How does it create the images it hears? Put another way, what does the body produce when influenced by sound?