Prometheus_open food lab is a research project using food to explore the remote environments of this planet (and potentially others), the thousands it encloses. It is method and practice, hinged on the concepts of edible and remote, which it repeatedly tears off their seat in a petrified culture. Dumbfounded. In a tradition died young, unable to translate outside itself. It operates on a linguistic level and therefore on perception. Because food is, first of all, a language: key for the interpretation and narration of the world. If edible is anything that could potentially be introduced into the body, food is a narrow selection applied by culture over time. Food is not natural. Likely, remote is not a status but rather a perception of the space determined by the possibility to access it and settle in. Remote is a state of mind.
Prometheus_lab, experimental laboratory and catalyst centre of the project, was born and developed in Progettoborca during the year 2018. It is based in one of the spaces of the former infirmary, in the innards of the Colonia. Expanding nucleus, it is the centre of operations for the exploration of the surrounding environments. Natural and cultural alike.
Since the first _exploration, it involves a heterogeneous number of _explorers from the various branches of the thinking, able to offer an algorithm as much complex for the decoding of the landscape where the practice take place.
From the space, Prometheus_ orchestrates and structures the activities that constitute the twine of the diverse research and operational lines: the exploration of the wild; the scoping of more or less dormant traditions, custom and knowledge; the establishment of networks in the area and beyond.
These, in turn, are translated into gatherings, panels, collaborations of all sorts, expositions and radical projects which broaden the spectrum and the structure itself of Prometheus_open food lab.
Efforts are now focused on the definition of new spaces inside and outside the Colonia, to house the two large-scale dimension of the project: a thematic library available both to the _explorers and to the public, and the archive which will host the material gathered and processed during the explorations.
Prometheus_open food lab is structured as a project aimed at a widespread practice to be applied to various contexts and landscapes in order to connect the knowledge, strategies and cultures able to foster resilience.
Explorations are currently active in the post Vaia regrowth in the forest surrounding the Colonia and in the complex ecosystem of fading sandbars in the Venice Lagoon.
We explore this planet as it was alien.
