Andrzej Tarasiuk is co-founder and Director of The Vendart Project. As an artist, he’s dedicated to painting, sculpture and photography. Through these disciplines, he thinks and reflects on the states of transformation, change, topics related to ecology, industry, etc. During his residency at ´ace he designed machines that mimic the transformation processes of states, such as oxygenation, that a tree makes. Andrzej does not pretend to arrive to fixed answers through his practices but finds in the undefined of the absurd an interesting space to arrive at temporary answers.

NATURE: A SPACE OF FLOWS (by Andrzej Tarasiuk)
Recently, at the Labverde residency, I have learned a lot of new things about the Amazon and how it interconnects with the continent and the world.  I am especially excited about idea of the Amazon as a Biotic moisture pump which moves and manages moisture throughout most of South America. A single large tree in the Amazon alone pumps 1000 liters of water into the atmosphere every day! In the context of deforestation and the very real possibility of human actions leading to the collapse of this crucial planetary life support system, I am interested in the questions of how are we to cope? Can technology replace what we are destroying? What would that even look like? What is the real cost associated with tempering with ecosystem services and how is this related to our value systems and culture?

During my time at ´ace I will be designing absurdist technology geared towards replacing the forest in the event of the Amazon collapsing, in effect creating a technological replacement for the Biotic moisture pump. As inspiration I am looking to current vaporizing systems, boilers, pumps, furnaces, solar panels, wind turbines and pipe systems. This will complement my continuing exploration of reality as process and how it is embodied within landscape exemplified within three visual categories: access points, natural systems and human settlements. The works produced will be based on my photographs taken during Labverde.