~ Vegetable Internet. 54°57'52“N 73°37'46”E ~

In the summer of 2021, the Posthuman Studies Lab platform, the Faculty of Contemporary Art of the Learning Environments and the Russian Chemical Technical University named after. DI. Mendeleev, launched the research project “Unstable Compounds”. The participants presented a scenario of an alternative future in which plants and machines participate in the joint construction of connections, forming a “vegetable Internet” — the result of the work was a collective installation created by artists together with researchers and engineers.

During the project, I kept a diary where I talked about why and how I had chosen the place for plant picking and what kind of a relationship I formed with this place.

~ June. Ash pond ~

The ash pond of the Omsk Thermal Power Plant-5 is divided into two sections: a dry ash section on the right, and a water section on the left.

From the side of the field, one could only see only a small hill — a dam. After going up the hill, a giant lake reveals itself, surrounded by pipes. Some pipes pour liquid into the lake. The landscape is eerie in some way, yet very beautiful.

The ash pond hosts many birds — seagulls, that rise like a cloud, fly, and then descend again. There are many other sounds: the sound of slurry pouring from the pipes, the sounds of insects, the sound of dump trucks.

I first heard about the ash pond from Ilya T. some years ago — he and his friends would often bike to the ash pond to hang out and enjoy the landscape. I liked the ash pond. It was only once when I saw people there. First I heard music and dogs barking. They were two girls around twelve, who had come from the side of the village. They were walking their dogs around the ash pond and listening to music on their phones. I hesitated to speak to them — they seemed to be in their own cozy world and did not pay me any mind.

After my return from the summer laboratory in Vyksa, I brought my friends Masha and Yura to the ash pond. We came after it had rained and it had already gotten dark. We parked far away not to get bogged down and had to walk. The ash pond was especially beautiful in the dark.

~ July. Ulyanovka ~

When I came to the ash pond for the first time I was surprised to find out that it was located at the edge of the village where I would often go as a child and where some of my mom’s relatives still live.

I asked my mom if she knew anything about the ash pond. Mom said that in rainy years it overflows and bursts onto the neighboring field, and then the whole birch woods “go away”, or disappear. People living nearby have been complaining to the local government for a long time but nothing changes. After strong winds, ashes rise up and then settle on gardens.

When I was a child, we would often go pick mushrooms in the birch woods, plant potatoes, and eat vegetables from kitchen gardens in Ulyanovka. I didn’t know anything about the ash pond back then.

After I had picked the plants for my project, I decided to find the house, where my mom’s sister Auntie Valya and her husband Uncle Pasha had lived before they both died, from memory. Auntie Valya was the nicest of my mom’s sisters. In her yard, she had a corridor of barns, each having its own smell, its own sounds. Those barns incited a keen interest in me, I liked observing the hens and chicks living there and looking at the things stored in the barns.

Guided by fragmentary memories and feelings, I almost intuitively found Auntie Valya’s house. Luckily, the barns were still there. I spend some time alone with my memories and went to the city.

~ August. Vicia and Pastinaca ~

For ashing and research, I collected two plant species: Vicia sativa and Pastinaca sativa. It was Pastinaca that became a promising species during research, but I will also talk about Vicia because they were equally important to me during collection. Vicia sativa is the common vetch, while Pastinaca sativa (or the parsnip) is a feral feed crop. It is an umbellifer similar to hogweed and, in some way, dill.

Why these plants? It could be their structure and mass that made them seem easy to collect. However, I think it was simply the fact that I liked them the most that became the key reason. I stared at the ash pond bank dotted with various plants and flowers and it was these two species that I somehow felt connected with — they seemed to be more expressive, having their own personalities.

Vicia grows in tangled thickets, resembling a head of curly hair. It has soft, thin, juicy bright green stems, it is easy to collect and one Vicia plant tangles with another, so it is hard to understand where one bush ends and another begins. Pastinaca towers as separate umbellated poles, with each plant looking like a separate organism, powerful and independent.

The collection itself turned out to be an uncomfortable process for me. I felt as if the plants were living organisms, having consciousness and personalities. I had to cut them and that made me uncomfortable.

The dried and ground plants boarded a plane to Moscow to be ashed in a chemical lab. I stared at the photo of sacks of ash sent to me in a chat and tried to guess which one was my Pastinaca. I wanted it to contain vanadium or other precious metals, so his sacrifice would not have been in vain.

After the lab, my relationships with Pastinaca and Vicia became much closer.