Elephant’s Foot

ELEPHANT’S FOOT

 

Elephant’s Foot is a performance and installation about a fungus that has appeared in the closed reactor 4 of Chernobyl. This fungus has adapted so it can live from gamma radiation, thus forming a symbiosis with the catastrophic environment of the Chernobyl site.

As part of the performance was an aquarium with water, a wooden log inoculated with mycelium, a soundtrack with sounds of frogs mixed with the sound of a Geiger counter and blue-red grow light.

The performance started out by reciting a text, telling the story. After this a short verse was read aloud and the log was taken from the aquarium (where the mycelium had been ‘shocked’ to life) and hung on a chain. This last setting was the fixed installation for the exhibition.

 

Performed first time in NLH Space, Copenhagen (DK), as part of the show Body Screeners, 2014