Planktochrome Experiment 1.1
Installation in Habit,ability! at The Newbridge Project 2022

Planktochrome installed in Habit Ability at The Newbridge Project, 2022

Planktochrome is an artwork that explores the interrelationships between marine phytoplankton and the other inhabitants of an exhibition space by measuring carbon dioxide levels in the work, and by monitoring the changing colour of the plankton as it photosynthesises and grows.

In the physical exhibition space people are invited to press a button to print their own planktochrome - a green monochrome timestamped with the current CO2 reading from the work - and online audiences can follow the plankton through their instagram account @planktochrome where the plankton post daily updates as they grow and photosynthesise throughout the exhibition. Each of these images becomes an event in the ongoing time of the exhibition.

Phytoplankton are vital to all living things and an intrinsic part of the carbon cycles of this planet . Each year these tiny organisms remove more than 30 billion tonnes of carbon from the atmosphere as well as producing an estimated 70% of the oxygen in the atmosphere, almost double that of all the rainforests on earth. Planktochrome makes visible phytoplankton’s actions, creating a discursive space to explore how they are entangled with the places we inhabit, and the importance of expanding beyond exclusively human thinking to address the climate emergency.

Pressing the button automattically prints a monochrome image of the current plankton colour timestamped with the Co2 concentration in the apparatus.

During the exhibition visitors could add 'planktochromes'to the wall creating a record of the activity within the gallery.

Graphs plotting the changing colours of the plankton and CO2 concentration in the apparatus are continually updated on the project website, offering a temporal space in which the patterns of photsynthesis, growth and use of the space can be seen at a different scale.

Planktochrome Apparatus