Symbiotic Stories is a series of narrative elements developed from an investigation conducted on the human condition in the current geological era of the Anthropocene and, more specifically, on our relationship with the plant world. It is a narrative intent on demythologizing and challenging the existing anthropocentric relationship between humans and plants in order to imagine future scenarios in which symbiosis and interspecies cooperation are our daily life.
The project therefore wants to open a reflection on the relationship between the artifice of human construction and the natural and uncertain character of vegetal species, showing not only what plants are and represent, but above all what they are capable of. Plants offer us an opportunity to imagine new forms of coexistence and cohabitation, since their world best represents the ability to live together.
Symbiotic Stories offers an alternative to the traditional pot cultivation of houseplants, working with epiphytic plants while respecting their natural habitat. These plants which, instead of rooting in the ground, grow on supports, clinging to the branches of other plants and trees, can be considered a masterpiece of evolution, resilience and adaptability.
Based on a careful observation of the needs and abilities of the epiphytes, the collection is modulated into a series of objects composed of a few essential materials. The use of industrial waste materials generated by human activity such as extruded aluminum profiles, highlights the disjunction between the natural and the anthropogenic, alongside the most definitive of regenerative processes: the appropriation of nature. In these intricate anthropogenic sculptures, various epiphytic plant species go in search of natural growth lines, exploring the features of human construction, giving life to a living and constantly evolving sculptural form.
In order to respect the democratic and decentralized nature of plant species, Symbiotic Stories presents itself as a model of democratic design in which the character of “Do It Yourself” design can be an invitation to replicability, even not exact. The project therefore does not intend to limit itself to a form or a definitive thought, but to enrich itself, in the long and uncertain dimension of time, with new interpretations to try to imagine new common languages, stimulating us to think about completely different objects and forms, but that bring with it a symbolism of hope and interspecies symbiosis.
