Materia medica: daylighting the sacred

At present, the human scale of development and industrialization is overwhelming and undermining the environment. Relational specificity - a fourth paradigm put forward by Miwon Kwon - is one way to address this predicament. Through relational/intuitive methodologies, the basis for Materia medica - remediation can occur by feeling an embodied connection to the Other. In nurturing relational engagements with the invisible elements that sustain and facilitate life, we can reawaken our perceptions of the natural world.

Materia medica is a response. Here, material processes with local plants embed a kind of awareness of the land. In knowing where and how colours can be grown, cultivated, and extracted sustainably, a certain intimacy with place occurs. And, by using local or organic materials for paintings or installations, fewer chemical inputs to produce a body of artwork are needed. Perhaps akin to chaos theory, these minute or incidental activities can be significant to how social and ecological processes unfold.

Medica or medicine is about healing that begins with relational activities. Healing is a process of relational exchange that initiates a movement toward balance…

Materia medica acknowledges that the sacred is an experience of something larger. It is an engaged porousness with the Other: the tree, the wax, the sky, the lake, the tapestry, the buried stream beyond the manhole, the stars. Here, a listening place dissolves the duality of the observer and the observed, and things intertwine.