Eating from your hands after picking a plant from the ground gives it a particular intensity of flavour – the taste carries the memory of gathering. As if something extra is added in that moment. On a walk through the forest, a few leaves of wood sorrel can hold the sharp, juicy joy of sourness. Can such experiences bring us closer to understanding the complex process of photosynthesis? How can it become tangible? This work of tasting photosynthesis by Eva unfolds further through Sinaʼs research into the pigments of purple anthocyanins and orange carotenes that quietly assist in lightʼs work. They act as subtle shields for the organism, a living sunscreen. Eva and Sina wander and forage together along the polluted edges of the Schelde river in Antwerp, gathering what persists. In considering humans as perhaps the only species to knowingly poison the soil that sustains it, they invite the visitor to taste these altered grounds.

During the workshop, we foraged reed at the Scheldt estuary near Stormkop, an area affected by contamination from microplastic pellets. Together we prepared a reed sorbet from common reed (Phragmites australis) and read and discussed excerpts from The Sacred and the Superfund in Robin Wall Kimmerer's Braiding Sweetgrass, reflecting on what it means to eat from altered grounds.