At first let’s set a base layer to understand what is actually going on on these photos. Following you’ll hear the term „Scoby“ quite often, so what actually is that? Scoby stands for "symbiotic culture of bacteria and yeast" and describes in a rather pragmatic way what it basically is: A mixture of bacteria and yeast entangled in a cellulose layer that forms as a by-product during the fermentation of kombucha tea. Some of you may know this, at least since the first Lockdown, fermenting has been experiencing a lot of hype. But what a few people (or maybe it was just me) seem to fully realize is that this organ-like substance is fully alive. And as with everything living, one can also "make kin" with this jellyfish-like mass. "Making kin" in this context can be understood very literally, but it also means the process of coming closer and adapting to each other - for the good of both. Obviously that doesn't happen without friction and compromise.

While a scoby usually is, as already mentioned, only a by-product and means to an end (tea+sugar+heat+scoby = kombucha), in this photo series it takes on a central meaning. By incorporating non-human individuals like the Scobys into established family structures in the frame of a photo series, this should question the conventional (human) kinship pattern as we know it (in a rather humorous way as it turned out). What began as a purely pictorial idea took on a life of its own as time went on. Radically the Scobys occupied whole parts of my parents’ house (where they grew in) by virtue of their penetrating odor which strongly reminds of vinegar acid and even made neighbors and bypassers hold their breath. The Scobys made entire rooms uninhabitable and clearly demarcated their territory. This led to friction within the family and several times they were threatened with abandonment. They even caused an explosion at one point (which might have been their reaction to frequent insults they had to bare every day, who knows). Especially for me, who nurtured and cared for them, these numerous conflicts were of particular strain. Because the Scobys didn't only occupy physical space but seriously had me emotionally attached to them. Often they wouldn't become as thick as desired or holey and I couldn't do anything about it or at least didn't know how. At this point it is important to know that Scobys have to grow over several weeks and every disturbance (movement, temperature change) decreases their growth. This powerlessness sometimes hit so deep that I even had difficulties to sleep, or couldn't think about anything else during the day - because a fragile Scoby was simply not viable later (to survive in family activities). So yes, as pathetic as it sounds, the Scobys had a firm grip on me. And that's precisely what the last picture, that seems to have gotten lost into the photo series, is supposed to represent symbolically by the Scobys levitating around me. My relationship to a microorganism, a cellulose layer if one wants to call it like that - which for a few months wouldn't let go of me and through me, almost „tyrannized" my family, forcing them to compromise. This image should be understood complementary to the other images that try to represent the incorporation of the Scoby into the household, hopefully even reinforce them.

MakeKin - semester project winter 20/21 inspired by "The Camille Stories - Children of Compost", part of "Staying with the Trouble - Making Kin in the Chtulucene" by Donna J. Haraway