Moss Graffiti

A fellow grad student forwarded along this link the website of Anna Garforth, an artists who is working with moss. The mosses are attaching it to the to the sides of buildings and cement walls to spell out words and phrases. Sort of Bio-Graffiti with mosses. Most of her projects listed under Design are of this type. You might be wondering how they attach the mosses to the walls. On one of the websites they say that "completely biodegradable ingredients" are used. I am a little skeptical about this as I did not see a posting of the recipe anywhere. Maybe there are secret ingredients that would open up their method to be used by others? I really hope that the ingredients do not include super glue and their statement about it being biodegradable is accurate. (Sorry but scientists tend to be skeptical until they see methods made public and reproducible results.)

Skepticism aside, I decided to look around to see if anyone else had similar ideas to use moss as urban art. Here are some of the websites that I found. This one features the artist Edina Tokodi and her use of mosses in urban settings. Once again I am not sure how she attaches it? Another question would be where do they get the moss that they are using? Are they growing it themselves, getting it from a landscaper, or collecting from the wild? That was another item that I did not see addressed.

Another one is by Ladybird with step by step instructions are featured on this DIY website. She gets huge points for sharing all the details regarding her moss growing methods on the web! I think that her skull and cross bones is pretty cool design. The moss itself does not look super green or too pretty. But I think that it shows realistic results of her moss growing recipe. It might be hit or miss on how well the mosses grow depending on the species used or the growing conditions.

Overall I think that it is a pretty neat idea. It is sure to put mosses on people's radar where they otherwise may be unaware of it, especially in urban locations.

P.S. If you locate any of the information that I have questions about please let me know through the comments. The world wide web is a big place and I might have just missed the information.