LES LICHENS NE MENTENT JAMAIS/LICHENS NEVER LIE

Departing from Nicoletta Fiorucci’s private garden in Grasse, in Southern France, several invited artists embark on Les lichens ne mentent jamais / Lichens Never Lie, a project that charts the multi-faceted nature and properties of lichens as weather ‘reporters’, in an effort to upturn the anthropocentric underpinnings of weather reporting; posing the question: how do other climate agents exist with and respond to their environment?

Conceived and initiated by artist Joana Escoval, and curated by Valeria Szabó Facchin and Margherita Dosi Delfini, Les lichens ne mentent jamais / Lichens Never Lie owes its title to a note she discovered on a sign in a pharmacognosy and mycology lab at the University of Rennes 1. Referring to an organism that is both algae and fungus and that acknowledges its capacity to act, the note points to the ability of lichens in acting as air filters and climate indicators, as well as quasi-immortal creatures existing in deep time, which rely on symbiotic interconnectedness with other organisms, and demonstrate astounding adaptability to survive extreme environments. The invited artists all decided to examine lichens as beings which can offer us teachings of co-dependance in the wake of climate change. Veering away from exhaustive praxes, the Foundation encourages reporters to sustainably build on their existing research and interests on lichens, by celebrating artistic cooperation and 'symbiosis'.

A constellation of creative research reports – consisting of photographs, audio recordings, films, map-making and poetical writings – will be shared via the World Weather Network over the year.

Jakob Kudsk Steensen, working with writer Joel Kuennen, will voice the deep time in which glacial lichens exist, whilst artist and poet Rindon Johnson, in collaboration with digital platform Infrasonica, will use the power of the sonic to celebrate lichens’ nature as symbiotic and multitudinous beings.

Nolan Oswald Dennis will investigate what a lichen cosmology could look like, exploring how their entangled nature, often relegated to the margins of our archives, may in fact shed light on the interdependencies of our cultural, social, political and historical sub-terrains.  

As a summative contribution, Joana Escoval will explore the seasons, weather psychology and dreams, informed by conversations with a lichenologist.

Participating Artists: Nolan Oswald Dennis, Joana Escoval, Rindon Johnson, Joel Kuennen, Jakob Kudsk Steensen. With the special contribution of Infrasonica (Eloisa Travaglini, Pablo José Ramírez, Sam Simon).

Lichens Never Lie is a project produced and curated by Nicoletta Fiorucci Foundation.