Research documentation – November 2025
Something unexpected has been happening in my house over the last few days. It started simply enough, but it’s become something else – a living system, a collaboration I set in motion but can’t control.
The Beginning: A favour
My sister went on holiday and gave me a lion’s mane mushroom growing kit to look after while she was away- one of those blocks you’re meant to grow at home. She knows I’m interested in mushrooms, in observing natural processes, in documentation of them but she’s more interested in reaping the harvest and cooking the mushrooms to eat.
I put it in my room because mushrooms need specific conditions – they need to emulate a forest experience. Light, but not direct sunlight. Warmth. Humidity. So I’ve been spraying it with water every few hours, as instructed- emulating the right woodland environment, tending it diligently.
It’s become a little ritual – going in, spraying it, watching it, waiting for something to happen.
The Fruit Flies
Within hours of putting the mushroom kit in my room, fruit flies appeared. Suddenly, unexpectedly, there they were. Tiny flies attracted to the mushroom, to the moisture, to whatever chemical signals mushrooms must emit.
I was really annoyed. I thought: oh great, now I’ve got fruit flies in my room. This is what I get for trying to grow mushrooms indoors.
The Spider
Then I noticed something.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw that a spider had already set up shop above the mushroom kit. Literally built a web right above it. It must have been there already – in the corner, waiting – or maybe it came when the flies came. I don’t know. That’s how house proud I am.
But now it’s catching the flies. I can see them caught in the web. Small bodies suspended in the air.
The Ecosystem
So this is what’s happening:
I introduced the mushroom.
The mushroom attracted flies.
The spider recognized opportunity and moved in.
The spider is catching the flies.
An ecosystem is evolving. Right behind me as I write this.
It’s a system I set in motion but didn’t design. I created the conditions – brought the mushroom in, provided water and warmth – but the rest happened without me. The flies came on their own. The spider made its own decision.
My room has become… A forest? A micro-ecosystem? A collaboration between me and the mushroom and the flies and the spider?
What the Mushroom Is Teaching Me
The mushroom kit came with instructions about growth cycles – apparently it can take a couple of weeks for mushrooms to actually start fruiting. But even before the mushrooms appear, the system is already working. Already alive. Already interconnected. The spores are sitting in wait, like the spider.
I’m tending the mushroom- religiously misting it with rain water. The mushroom attracts flies. The spider tends the flies. And I’m documenting all of it – the whole system as it develops.
There’s something here about:
Authorship – Who made this system? I brought the mushroom, but I didn’t bring the flies or the spider. We’re co-creators.
Intention – I intended to grow mushrooms. I didn’t intend to create a fly-catching system. But here it is anyway.
Control – I can control the water, the light, the temperature. But I can’t control what the mushroom attracts or what the spider does. The system has its own mysterious logic.
Collaboration – This is genuine collaboration with non-human agents. The mushroom is doing its work. The spider is doing its work. I’m doing my work (documentation, misting, observing). None of us are in charge.
Documentation
I want to photograph all of this. The whole thing. The mushroom as it grows. The flies as they arrive. The spider in its web. The catches.
This is process-based work. Time-based work. I can’t photograph the “finished” piece because there isn’t one. The piece is the ongoing system. The collaboration happening in real time.
It’s also about scale. This is happening in my room – in domestic space, in personal space. Not in a studio or a gallery or even outside in “nature.” Nature has come inside. The boundary between domestic life and wild life has collapsed.
What This Connects To
In my tutorial with Jonathan, we talked about capture. We talked about archiving and writing. About what it means to document processes.
This mushroom ecosystem is all of that:
- The spider is the main hunter/ capturer.
- I’m capturing (photographing the system) and writing about it here.
- The mushroom is capturing (my attention, the flies’ attention, creating the conditions for this whole interaction). It’s going to capture its own space in my room. Hopefully.
It’s also about non-human agency. The spider has agency – it chose to build there, it’s actively hunting. The mushroom has agency – it’s growing, attracting, creating chemical signals. The flies have agency – they came, they’re trying to survive.
I’m just one agent among many. I have the camera and the capacity to spray water, but I don’t have ultimate control. I can’t make the mushroom fruit faster. I can’t tell the spider where to build. I can’t stop the flies from flying in through the window which I leave open most of the time. I guess I invited this…
What Happens Next
I don’t know what happens next. Maybe the mushrooms will fruit and I’ll harvest them. Maybe the spider will leave when the flies are gone. Maybe more flies will come. Maybe the whole system will collapse or transform into something else.
But I’ll keep documenting it. Keep photographing. Keep observing this small ecosystem that’s emerged in my bedroom through a combination of intention (mine) and accident (everything else).
Because this is what my practice is becoming about: witnessing systems, documenting collaborations, recognizing the agency of non-human makers.
The mushroom kit was from my sister. But what it’s teaching me about collaboration, control, and co-creation – is only because of the unexpected collaborators who have entered the room.
This post documents an ongoing work-in-progress. The mushroom ecosystem is still evolving as I write this. I’m using it to think through questions of authorship, collaboration, and non-human agency in art practice.