Workshop with Gabriele Brandstetter from project B02 and Mercator-Fellow Lia Rodrigues.

Lia Rodrigues borrowed this term from what is known as syntropic farming, a model of agriculture developed by the Swiss researcher and farmer Ernst Götsch, who moved to Brazil in 1980 where he created this practice. It is based on the natural process of ecosystem regeneration with the aim of introducing various species.

The principle is to create more life and soil fertility, a prosperous system and abundance - with the increase of biodiversity, the possibility of coexistence and mutual help between different and seasonal species.

Syntropic farming is defined by creation rather than destruction, in which plants, animals and humans are part of an interconnected system. Lia Rodrigues tries to transposed this idea (coexistence, diversity, mutual aid, abundance) in her projects, encouraging, as in a syntropic forest, the establishment of a regenerative, fertile, and prosperous ecosystem.

*'Lachryphagy', which literally means “tear-feeding”, is a phenomenon which is extremely hard to witness in nature. It is one of the ways that butterflies can get precious nutrition. Butterflies sip on tears to get sodium and other minerals which are needed for egg production and metabolism. It happens in the western Amazon rain forest.

This workshop is the third part of a series that began in December 2023.
It will take place on three afternoons on
Tuesday, February 6, 2024 from 2 pm to 5 pm
Wednesday, February 7, 2024 from 2 pm to 6 pm
Thursday, February 8, 2024 from 2 pm to 6 pm.