Tracing the Roots of Colour: Dye, Food, and Ecological Narratives

This 2023 workshop at Kasteel Ter Beken brought first-year Textile Design students from LUCA School of Arts into direct engagement with the Dye Garden. Working with plants such as woad, yarrow, sorrel, chamomile, Jerusalem artichoke, and rhubarb, students explored their symbolic, culinary, and historical meanings. They dyed textiles with the plants, cooked dishes like sorrel soup and rhubarb compote, and wrote short plant-based stories printed on the dyed napkins. These elements came together in a collective table scenography—shared through food and storytelling.

The project bridges Annelotte Lammertse’s research into urban dye ecologies and the fragile layers of our natural landscapes with Lara’s exploration of memory, ancestral knowledge, migration, and cross-cultural food narratives. Now exhibited as part of The Scope of Stories in 2025, it reflects an evolving dialogue between land, craft, and the stories we carry.

Student contributions by Frida Luyckx, Sam McKendy, Ella Rogge, Ulrike Rutten, Juliette Stragier, Josefien Vandenborre, Anouck Vanraes, Marten Voets, Julie Boodt, Soetkin Claeys, Loes De Blieck, Simon De Bosscher, Fleur de Vries, Aytül Durmaz, Gloria Genoe, Cennet Kayaalp, Zsa-Zsa Leye.

The exhibition, curated by Jonathan De Maeyer at Blanco in Ghent, gathers artists working between rural and urban contexts, with a focus on ecology, food, and human connection. Through fiction and documentary forms, it traces the many narratives rooted in vernacular landscapes.

Featuring the work of Seasonal Neighbours, Claire Chassot, Tim Theo Deceuninck, Jonathan De Maeyer, Anastasia Eggers, Ciel Grommen, Rural Relations Writing Club & Ioana Lupascu, Maximiliaan Royakkers, Erien Withouck, Jana Vasiljević, Julie Van Kerckhoven, Lara Bongard & Annelotte Lammertse., collective dinner hosted by Jana Joanna Milbou .

Curator: Jonathan De Maeyer.