Natural Dependencies // Suzette Bousema & Catherine Ostraya x Roland van Dierendonck

In this second podcast of the TR/X/E TALKS series you are introduced to the exhibition Natural Dependencies that took place in October 2021 at TR/X/E in The Hague. Natural Dependencies was a multimedia exhibition about the connectivity of all living things, using mycelium as a metaphor.

The conversation is led by Roland van Dierendonck (NL) an artist and PhD candidate at the Lab4Living, Sheffield Hallam University. Suzette Bousema (NL) and Catherine Ostraya (RU/NL), two of the exhibiting artists, guide Roland through the exhibition and describe their disparate takes on working with mycelium. While their discussion unfolds questions arise as: Is symbiosis necessarily collaborative? What role does the fungal network play in plant migration? And how do social metaphors influence our human interactions with each other and the world?

Suzette and Catherine curated the exhibition and organised a mushroom walk guided by Kees Pinster. Snippets of the walk introduce the various capacities of mushrooms growing right under our noses in The Hague.

Other exhibiting artists that were not present in the talk are Sophie Steengracht (NL), and in collaboration with Suzette Bousema Merle Bergers (NL) and Rafaele Andrade (BR/NL).