santiagomorilla

Tilling Roots & Seeds Art Residency

Bridging Art, Science, and Ecosystems in Tilling Roots & Seeds Art Residency
Residency period: November 2024 & April 2025 - Barcelona & its Metropolitan Area.
Mentored by Quo Artis

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I undertook a two-phase residency designed to support transdisciplinary exploration, sustainable practice, and engagement with local agricultural communities. Structured to allow for both temporal flexibility and personal balance—values underscored in the project’s gender and care strategies—my residency took place over two three-week periods: the first in November 2024, and the second between March and April 2025. This two-part format enabled an iterative research-to-production process that integrated time for reflection, experimentation, and family life.

During the initial phase, I engaged in site-specific fieldwork across a range of urban and peri-urban agricultural initiatives in Catalonia. He visited locations such as the community gardens of Green For Good Project by Ferrer Sustainability Foundation, as well as Contorno Urbano in L’Hospitalet del Llobregat, the hydroponic installations of Tectum Garden, and the vegetable gardens associated with Fundació Catalunya La Pedrera—Món Sant Benet and the Alícia Foundation in Sant Fruitós del Bages. These visits served as entry points for meaningful dialogue with local caretakers and farmers, fostering an embodied understanding of ecological and cultural dynamics.

The second residency phase emphasized sensorial research and audiovisual production. At this point, I visited Mint Lab at the University of Murcia, where he met with Professor Paco Calvo, a leading researcher in the field of plant intelligence and a key collaborator in the first edition of the project. The visit provided an opportunity to exchange perspectives on plant cognition, agency, and behavior, and to explore potential intersections between scientific research and artistic practice. Employing biosonification—a method that converts the electrical activity of living organisms such as fungi or soil microbes into audible sound— I developed a sonic exploration of subterranean life. This approach was conceptually grounded in the work of Michael Mäder’s "Sounding Soil", and complemented by readings from microbiology, soil ecology, and environmental humanities. The residency also drew on feminist and multispecies perspectives from authors such as María Puig de la Bellacasa and the contributors to "Multispecies Futures".

Through this layered methodology, I produced a body of research that bridges art and science. My artwork invites audiences to “listen with care” to the often-invisible ecosystems beneath our feet.

On April 8, 2025, Escola Massana hosted the workshop Experimental Biosonification with Saprotrophic Fungi, led by the sound researcher Joaku de Sotavento and myself.

This hands-on session offered participants the opportunity to explore the perceptual, gastronomic, and artistic dimensions of shiitake mushroom cultivation on oak logs—a technique with centuries-old roots in Southeast Asia.

Combining theory and practice, the workshop focused on the biosonification of fungi, using custom open-source hardware designed to detect, amplify, and interpret the bioelectrical activity of living organisms.

It offered a space for participants to rethink the boundaries between organisms, technologies, and human perception—through sound.

+INFO: https://tillingrootsandseeds.eu/santiago-morilla-artist-in-residency/

︎ 01/08/26