Workshop Series: Lichen Creation & Ideation

The Lichen Likers* of the Living Art & Ecology Lab will host the second workshop in our series. We are artists learning with lichens, observing and experiencing their symbiotic lifestyle, conceptualizing, and practicing respectful, creative activities with lichens. In this workshop, we invite you to join us in five different hands on activities involving observing, drawing, ideating, mediating, and creating with lichen – in ways that do not harm them.

* The Lichen Likers art research group includes art faculty Doosung Yoo and Amy Youngs and art students Anna Arbogast, Madison Blue, Xiuer Gu, Elias Marquez, and Nate Tyler.

Follow Lichen Likers on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/lichenlikers

 

Materials Matter – tour of exhibition at Wexner Center for the Arts

All are welcome to join a special tour and discussion on Thursday November 16th, 2 – 4pm. Meet at the entrance of the bookstore of the Wexner Center for the Arts.

Explore the concepts of material sourcing, use, and ethics in artistic practice during a tour and discussion of the Fall 2023 exhibitions.

Where do artists get their materials from and why does it matter? What are the ethical considerations behind their use and display? Featured artists include Harold Mendez, Jumana Manna, and Sahar Khoury. This dialogue is a collaboration of the Learning & Public Practice at the Wexner Center for the Arts and the OSU Living Art and Ecology lab.

Harold Mendez exhibition at the Wexner Center for the Arts

Workshop Series: Learning Lichen!

The ‘Learning Lichen’ workshop is the first one in a series of art workshops with Living Art & Ecology Lab, where our art communities are learning with lichens, observing and experiencing their symbiotic lifestyle, conceptualizing, and practicing respectful, creative activities with lichens. This first workshop includes a talk by Emeritus Professor Robert Klips, author of ‘Common Mosses, Liverworts, and Lichens of Ohio’, who will speak about lichens and share his research experience in the study of lichens and bryophyte ecology, and long-term teaching in the Department of Evolution, Ecology and Organismal Biology at OSU.


The first workshop is a great opportunity to learn more about the science of lichens, such as identification, anatomy, morphology, and interactions with environment. Also, it would be a good opportunity to learn more about lichens’ symbiotic lifestyle with other organisms, including being ‘non-binary’, ‘multiple’, ‘resilient’, and ‘beyond human time’. Learning scientific backgrounds and facts will help us move to the next themes of workshop series, in which we will discuss and envision how we might better approach non-human beings, including and embracing ‘others’ as we learn from lichens.

At the beginning of the workshop, the members of ‘Lichen Research & Art Project’, Doosung Yoo and Amy Youngs will briefly introduce our collaborative work, along with undergraduate interns Anna Arbogast, Madison Blue, Xiuer Gu, Elias Marquez, and Nate Tyler. We hope to engage more artists in our projects and future workshops. Please join us!

Our Lichen Likers Instagram is linked in the poster QR code

Past Visiting Artists

Visiting artists from Spring 2023

Hope Ginsburg, Professor of Art and Virginia Commonwealth University.
Marta de Menezes, Bio Artist, presented, Art and Immunology: a lifelong relationship
Regine Rapp & Christian de Lutz of Art Laboratory Berlin

Past Events

Selected past events and workshops from Spring 2023 are highlighted below.

Biodegradable Paint-Making Workshop: extracting pigment from oranges, cabbage, flowers, and tea to make watercolors and egg tempera paints that are 100% biodegradable using at-home composting methods.

 

Symbiosis Walks: Recurring series hosted by the Living Art & Ecology Lab to explore the local ecosystem of our campus. These observational excursions are accessible to all, and highlight the symbiotic relationships between wild organisms living on campus – including hawks, insects, lichen, and trees. Check art.osu.edu/events  for the next upcoming event!

ARTificial Intelligence with Springtail Insects: investigating visual storytelling from the perspective of an invertebrate, as told by ChatGPT and DALL-E.