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Craft Ecologies: Wool, Yam juice, and Wind


by RUI YANG
 

Craft Ecologies is an exploratory exhibition hosted by Viral Ecologies. Through this exhibition,11 undergraduate students from the course Knowledge Lab at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, look closely at the complex systems that bring material into being.






















Day 1

I soaked the yam root for 2 hours and then boiled it in hot water. The water turned red when I boiled the juice for 2 hours, but it wasn't thick enough, so I boiled it for another 3 hours. The yam juice became thicker and darker than before. After straining the yam juice, I kept it in the fridge for the next day when the sun came out.





Day 2

The next morning I soaked the fabric in the yam juice for the brown coating. After 20 minutes, I spread the fabrics on the ground under direct sunlight to dry. The weather was not very stable that day, so the moisture hasn’t evaporated that day.



Day 3

On the third day, I continued to spread out the fabrics that still had moisture for drying. They are now in a semi-dry state, which I think is the best possible state. I can't tell how I feel about them, but I think they are alive. They were dry at the first stage and now they are floppy. I wanted to see how they looked after they were dry, but in fact, on the third day, they were not too wet and did not cling to the ground too much, which had the feeling of standing up.


Day 4

The fourth day is a sunny day. Almost all the fabrics were dry in the afternoon, especially the Silk hankies which dried fast. The Wool fabric on the left side of it also dried, and when I picked them up they had a kind of crispy feeling, like paper, and they were lighter than before. Since the texture of Silk hankies used to be very soft, now it's like a crispy sheet which is very different.