Moss­es were the first plants to emerge from the waters, some 470 mil­lion years ago. Beside us on the pave­ment; rest­ing above us on roofs; hug­ging rocks and trees – moss­es are our omnipresent and often ignored ances­tors. What might these liv­ing fos­sils teach us? What sto­ries do they hold?

Tak­ing ref­er­ences from sci­en­tif­ic study and the rad­i­cal space opened up when we shift from a human-cen­tred per­spec­tive, this work­shop is a col­lec­tive jour­ney through life at oth­er scales.

Facil­i­tat­ed by Jamie Allan, and held in the main gallery at Site, the work­shop began with a read­ing, fol­lowed by a guid­ed imag­i­na­tion exer­cise. The ses­sion built towards a col­lec­tive sto­ry­telling encounter, inspired by moss­es and oth­er small organ­isms. Par­tic­i­pants were wel­comed to share their impres­sions or to lis­ten to others.

This work­shop worked in dia­logue with the work of Vic­to­ria Lucas in the Plat­form 20: Heavy Water exhibition.

Jamie Allan is an artist, film­mak­er and cura­tor with a back­ground in doc­u­men­tary film­mak­ing and com­mu­ni­ty cin­e­ma. His recent work revolves around the eco­log­i­cal rever­ber­a­tions of human his­to­ries, with a spe­cif­ic focus on the rela­tions between ani­mals and human bor­der zones. He has a Mas­ters in Doc­u­men­tary Film from the Doc­No­mads itin­er­ant film school, and is cur­rent­ly a researcher with the Col­lec­tive Prac­tices Post-Mas­ter at the Roy­al Insti­tute of Art, Stockholm.