To Bee

installation, video documentation 2019
sculptures / pheromones/ screen / digital photo frames

Collaboration with Natalia Fedorova, artist, curator, PhD in literary theory
Tatiana Zachepilo, scientist zoologist, neurobiologist, PhD in biology
To Bee is a project about interspecies communication between humans and bees. We create scenarios of interspecies communication that go beyond the boundaries of the anthropocentric paradigm.
Humanity affects bees radically: colonies die from pesticides and herbicides, bees cannot return to the hive because cellular communications disrupt their navigation system based on the earth's magnetic field.
We are exploring ways of chemical communication in honey bee society to help bees adapt to the anthropocene: to find a way to the hive, to avoid dangerous territories.
Bees in the colony communicate with each other using pheromones. To Bee is an experiment to create a pheromone communicator translating the sign system of bees into smells familiar to humans.
Umwelt is a subjective world of perception of species. To Bee project is a translator, a base for the common semiosphere of human and bee umwelts.