Exkursion to Laurence Douny from Matters of Activity (II)

The next session of our excursion brought an important shift in perspective, from biological material practices to anthropological insights on materials, making, and meaning. Mareike Gast once again opened the session, this time introducing the work of Laurence Douny, an anthropologist and archaeologist affiliated with the Matters of Activity cluster at the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. Laurence’s lecture, titled „What is in a Dye?“, explored mud dyeing practices from an interdisciplinary standpoint. Drawing on her fieldwork and cultural research, she presented the case of Ga vouwo, a traditional mud dye from West Africa. Laurence invited us to reconsider the material not merely as a static product, but as a vibrant node within complex social, environmental, and spiritual systems. Through her work, she questioned: How do different actors (human, microbial, mineral) experience and co-create the dye? She described the act of dyeing as an interface of knowledge, memory, and tradition, shaped by interactions between people, places, materials, and techniques. In her analysis, the dye becomes more than color; it becomes a living practice infused with cultural resonance and ecological sensitivity. Laurence emphasized that sustainability must be understood not only in technical or environmental terms, but also through cultural sustainability – the persistence and adaptation of knowledge systems across generations. Her presentation challenged us to examine how we, as designers, engage with materials: Do we respect their life histories? Are we attentive to their agencies, their embedded knowledge, and their ecological entanglements? The lecture concluded with a lively discussion on material agency, co-designing with nature, and the intersections between craft, heritage, and contemporary design. Students reflected on how the insights from mud dyeing traditions could inform their own microbial factory projects, pushing them to approach material development with more humility, contextual awareness, and openness to non-human collaborators.