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Beneath the fields lies a hidden network of thread-like fungi, exchanging nutrients with the roots of the crops we eat, a relationship as old as plant life itself, and usually invisible to us. In my installation, Branching Beneath the Fields, this underground world is made visible through microscope images and textiles.

The work explores the intricate partnership between arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi and the roots of crops in East Anglia: the fungi feed the crops, and the crops, in turn, feed the fungi, in a continuous and hidden exchange that ultimately feeds us.

In this site specific installation made for the Food Museum in Stowmarket, images taken looking down through a microscope are installed above our heads, inverting our gaze. Into this space I inserted textile pieces made out knitted, braided and twisted threads. I developed these textile works in collaboration with TextielLab Tilburg, the professional workshop of TextielMuseum Tilburg, NL.

For this installation, I collected roots from wheat and barley crops across East Anglia. The farms ranged from intensive, conventional arable farms to regen and organic farms. I also travelled to the coast to sample marram grass on beaches and in dunes.

I then took the roots to labs to be examined for arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi under different kinds of microscope. Jen McGaley did most of the imaging at the Crop Science Centre, University of  Cambridge, and I did some at Vasilis Kokkoris Lab at A-LIFE, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.