Ferment Lab is a participatory space for food and social fermentation and is a current active and ongoing project of Pixelache Helsinki.
Fermentation is a natural process that man has learned how to master. It is a crucial element to making foods and beverages in order to preserve it and enchance its taste and nutritional properties. In biochemical terms, it is a process that converts sugars present in foods, to acid, gazes or alcohol, under the action of ferments (such as bacteria, yeast, mold), most of the time in anaerobic (oxygen-deprived) conditions.
Ferment Lab has taken various forms in its exploration of the phenomenon of fermentation. The project involves research and experimentation into food preparation as well as into social interpretations of the concept. Overall Ferment Lab aims to be conducted in various locations in order to collect parallel stories of food and social transformation, transplant gained recipes into other contexts and create new knowledge and meanings through experiments in social fermentation.
As an ongoing Pixelache project since 2014, it has taken various forms dealing with the concept of fermentation, involving research into food preparation and experimentation, as well as the social interpretation of the concept. Since then Ferment Lab was hosted by Station Messschiff Eleonore - StadtWerkstatt (Linz, 2015), Treasure Hill Artists Village (Taipei, 2015), TW Bioart (Taipei, 2015) Planet B at NRW-Forum (Düsseldorf , 2016). Local events in Helsinki were mostly taking part in collaboration with Herttoniemitalo and Temporary spaces within the context of the annual Pixelache Festival.
Ferment Lab Strasbourg was proposed by Andrew Gryf Paterson, Nathalie Aubret & Agnieszka Pokrywka from Pixelache to Le Shadok in May 2016 as a contribution to their international artist-residency project during late February to early July 2017, which contributes exhibition of process, artefacts and outgoings within the 'Strasbourg: Laboratoire à demain' (Laboratory of tomorrow) group exhibition at Shadok in October 2017-January 2018. Production was supported directly by Shadok, with travel support from Taike (Arts Promotion Centre Finland).
Read the related overview post here & see Zine part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4 & part 5.
Online #fermentlab
Facebook group: Ferment Lab Strasbourg
Media archive (photos, videos, pdfs, graphic illustrations): https://archive.org/details/@fermentlab-pixelache
Project presence on Shadok webpages
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Ferment Lab began in 2014-2015 as a collaborative conversation between Agnieszka Pokrywka, Mikko Laajola, Samir Bhowmik, Petri Ruikka & Mari Keski-Korsu, centred around fermentation and collective growing in neighbourhood practices. In 2015 the project was led by Agnieszka Pokrywka, which Andrew Gryf Paterson joined at the end of the year. Nathalie Aubret & Hervé Munsch were key collaborators in the Ferment Lab Strasbourg process. Many other unnamed persons in multiple locations have been involved in workshops, we appreciate very much your contribution, and bubbles still continue, and scents linger fondly.
Currently, Pixelache members involved in Ferment Lab are Agnieszka Pokrywka & Andrew Gryf Paterson.
Contact us at fermentlab [at] pixelache.ac
Ferment Lab was busy and active last year, but in Strasbourg! We make a reflections & celebration swap evening with you, Helsinki scene..
We will tell about and share our 5-part zine in printed form.. About the year long process commissioned by Le Shadok, a digital maker cultural centre in Strasbourg, and the collaborations we made & those we met. We focused on cabbage. Kimchi, Choucroute (Sauerkraut), and other vegetable ferments, but got our toes and fingers moist with dancing, pH experiments, DIY microscopy, and edible artefacts. We made an interactive touch-listen table of our...
Windfall Crops Fermentation Workshop is a participatory hands-on tutorial which uses fermentative processes to turn crops, which weren't picked up before winter, into eatables. That mainly concerns apples still hanging on the leafless trees or lying down under the snow but also root vegetables buried in freezing earth. The participants are welcome to bring their own frozen or useless crops, however, that's not mandatory. To participate in the workshop no prior knowledge of fermentation or special equipment is needed.
The workshop is a part of Pixelache's Ferment Lab project.
Waste Fermentation workshop is a participatory hands-on tutorial which uses fermentative processes in order to transform waste organic matter and food into eatables. More than that it intends to shift a common way of thinking about food and waste simply by reversing this process: we are going to turn organic matter we usually throw away (fruit peels, greens of vegetables or slightly expired products) into vinegar and kinds of fermented pickles.
To participate in the workshop no prior knowledge of fermentation or special equipment is needed. The participants are ought to bring just a big...
Biological Wisdom and Social Transformation meets Ferment Labis an event joining two initiatives from Berlin and Helsinki dealing with various forms of plant and bacterial growth and their interconnection with societal change.
Biological Wisdom and Social Transformationis a series of actions started in Berlin that explores to what extent can we invent new social and art forms when turning to the deep wisdom and intelligence that lies in biological systems. Simultaneous events on the themes of soil, social fermentation and fungi have taken place since January of this year and during the...
Ferment Lab is an initiative exploring intertwines of food fermentation and winter urban farming as a means for activating local neighbourhoods. Ferment Lab in collaboration with Hertsikan Pumppu invites for two events: fermentation workshops (22 and 23 September) andbrainstorming(26 September)ona collectively powered greenhouse module prototype which Pixelache works for almost a year.
Ferment Lab workshopsareparticipatory hands-on tutorials dealing with sustainability of preservative food processing through fermentation, a chemical alteration that transforms nutritious substances into...
Ferment Lab is an initiative exploring intertwines of food fermentation and winter urban farming as a means for activating local neighbourhoods. Ferment Lab in collaboration with Hertsikan Pumppu invites for two events: fermentation workshops (22 and 23 September) andbrainstorming(26 September)ona collectively powered greenhouse module prototype which Pixelache works for almost a year.
Ferment Lab workshopsareparticipatory hands-on tutorials dealing with sustainability of preservative food processing through fermentation, a chemical alteration that transforms nutritious substances into...