In the summer of 2022 artists Audrey Snyder and Joe RIley climbed aboard The Mothership @themothership_tangier an artist’s residency led by Yto Barrada and situated in Tangier, Morocco, overlooking the Straight of Gibraltar.

The project is surrounded, and grounded by a garden of tinctorial plants. Flowers grown and used by Yto and the many visitors to this place to dye textiles, make pigments, and more. ⁣
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Shortly after we arrived arrived, Yto pointed out a small wooden stool. She said that The Mothership could use some more of these stools, which are common throughout the city and country. Street vendors perch atop these stools, people shine shoes from these stools, they are in kitchens, sidewalks, and in gardens. Although they appear all over, these stools are also hard to come by. Like any favorite/perfect chair: they can be deeply personal, and attached to place. ⁣

We collected discarded materials, useful debris, flotsam, jetsam, and various hand tools scattered around the grounds of The Mothership (like so many seeds and plants). We tried to learn from the stool that Yto shared with us, and to fold its brilliance and usefulness back into into the forms and functions of the dye garden. The stool became a press for drying flowers harvested from the garden.

The weight of the sitter compresses sheets of newsprint, and straps secure all the materials in place. Overtime the flowers are pressed, dried, and archived..and maybe put back to work as the colorful matter of another project. These flowers and furniture are also (s)tools after all.