Becoming a Flower

About Facilitator

Gracia Echeverria is a Chilean designer living in New York. Her design practice is mostly dedicated to editorial projects; working as an art director, producer, and editor, collaborating with multidisciplinary teams. She is also an avid gardener, composter, and sometimes musician.

Objective

Becoming a Flower** invites participants to imagine the perspective of a flower—its relationship to pollinators, how color and scent might attract or repel other species, and its role in ecosystems ranging from the park to our streets. Through walking meditation, group reading, and a poster-making exercise, we’ll explore different ways of sensing one’s surroundings and then communicating those ideas to others, both human and more-than-human.

Flowers around us are carriers of information. They have a role as the reproductive organs of plants, and with the help of pollinators, they reproduce. (Examples of pollinators are birds, bats, butterflies, moths, flies, beetles, wasps, small mammals, and most importantly, bees). Bees. who see in ultraviolet wavelengths. perceive UV patterns around the mouth of the flower. The patterns act as a guide, steering bees toward the nectar and pollen. More commonly, these visual signs, rather than scent, direct the bee’s pollination. These markings signal a message, shaping the bee’s behavior. This idea of patterns and signals inspires us to think about flowers as posters, as callings for action, or as invitations.

Like the flower, what signals will you circulate? What types of attraction might your message inspire? And, how might nature herself act as a guide in the development of metaphors or provocations in the fliers we make?

** Becoming a Flower was originally developed by Jean Brennan and Gracia Echeverria

What's Included

• Collage Material
• Readings
• Scissors
• Glue

What to Bring

• Magazines for collaging

CURRICULUM

Flowers are carriers of information. Bees can see in ultraviolet wavelengths and perceive UV patterns around the mouth of the flower. These patterns are guides that signal where are the nectar and the pollen. If we consider these visual signs as messages that the bees can “read” to understand where are the resources they are looking for, this inspires us to think about flowers as posters, as callings for action, or as invitations. For this workshop, we propose to make flyers as flowers and spread them around. 

Like the flower, what signals will you circulate? What types of attraction might your message inspire? Who will be addressed by your content? And, how might nature herself act as a guide in the development of metaphors or provocations in the fliers we make?