Georgette Brown loves everything about fungi and in a personally turbulent year they have provided a crucial focus for her emotions and creativity, she tells Rebecca Fox.
The T-shirt is the giveaway. Emblazoned with "I see mycelium" Georgette Brown’s passion for all things mushroom is there for everyone to see.
The quote on her T-shirt is from United States mycologist Paul Stamets, who likes to refer to mycelium as "The earth‘s natural internet”.
It hit a nerve for Brown, who lives in Wellington, inspiring the theme and title for her exhibition at the Blue Oyster Gallery in Dunedin.
"It was going to be a poetic exploration of my love of fungi."
Unfortunately, as the exhibition came together Brown hit some tough personal times as her Australian-based father’s illness escalated. He died just after the exhibition opened.
The themes of the show then moved into more personal terrain for her.
"My connection to fungi has deepened as I go through this grief. Fungi and their life cycles have much to teach about death, life, and everything in between.”
To cope with the emotions and anxiety she was going through, Brown took up stained-glass making.
"It calms my anxieties."
The art form also linked her to her father. It was during her childhood explorations of the Australian Eucalyptus forest she grew up in with her father, a painter, that she first discovered mushrooms — alongside their search for fairies.
"Most of my childhood I was drawing mushrooms and fairies. There hasn’t been a time when I wasn’t doing it [drawing]."
When she returned to stay with her father in a converted church when she was 17 years old, her studio bedroom was lit by stained-glass windows.
Ever since then she has wanted to try making stained-glass. Her father’s escalating mental illness was the final push to give it a go.
"I felt I finally needed to learn. There is this huge connection between me and him."
So the exhibition features her first efforts at making stained-glass with, of course, a fungus-inspired pattern showing mycelium’s tangled tendrils.
The colours are inspired by her experiences out searching for fungi.
"You see this flash of colour out of the corner of your eye. The glass is evocative of that flash of colour."
The second part of the exhibition’s title "I hear the sound of breaking glass" refers literally to the breaking of glass for her works, as well as a symbolic interpretation of anxiety and chaos.
"I do like the sound of it. It’s calming for me."
So Brown, who works part-time in an art supply shop, has brought two loves of her life together in this exhibition which also includes mixed-media mushroom sculptures, painting, poetry and a video work.
"The big painting is my favourite part. It features my friend Juju holding a pig, with were-were koako at her feet. We often go out looking for mushrooms together so it pays homage to her and that experience."
Brown’s love of fungi has been a constant for her, throughout her life. In her teens she dabbled in their psychedelic properties, and during one of her first psychedelic trips she "looked up into the sky and saw a hot pink mycelium-like pattern all throughout".
This pattern then started showing up in her drawings and paintings, often depicted in the sky.
These days Brown is more interested in fungi’s abilities to attune her to environments by their "very being", more so than ingesting them.
"I’ve been obsessed all my life. I have always been hyper-aware of them, and my awareness of them evolves as I evolve. It’s like a spiritual thing, my spirituality."
So much so, she is hooked on the iNaturalist app and is often heading out on excursions to find particular mushrooms.
"It’s like a treasure hunt; it takes it to the next level."
Knowing mushrooms are found on every continent and exist in so many different forms is exciting, she says. She also finds solace in the fact they existed here before us and will most likely exist after us too.
"Autumn is my favourite season as so many mushrooms are out."
She feels an intense pull to search these mushrooms out, thinking nothing of driving for a few hours in search of a rare type. Footage from some of these trips features in the exhibition’s video.
"While some forage for mushrooms to eat, for me it’s more about observing. They are my favourite food as well, but I usually buy them."
Her favourite way of eating them is when her friend Flo, who is "one of the best chefs I know", forages and cooks porcini.
More and more people are becoming interested in fungi so it is becoming more mainstream and popularised.
Brown is very excited by this as "it’s about time that mushrooms get the recognition they deserve”.
Going out on mushroom walks has also become a nice way to spend time with her friends, as she often takes them along.
"I’m sober so it’s a social thing to do that isn’t going out and drinking. It’s another way to bond with people. We take a lunch and make a day of it. It’s another gift mushrooms give me."
For this exhibition she is also going to share her love of fungi with a shared dinner featuring her beloved mushrooms and then the next day will hold a walk to search for and observe them at Orokonui Ecosanctuary.
When not searching for mushrooms, Brown also likes to play music with her siblings in a band called Womb. She plays the drums.
Her sibling Cello Forrester worked on the exhibition with her, scoring the video with an emotional cello track and helping write co-write the poem. Their brother Hazzie helped edit the video work.
"They’re both very talented, and I am so honoured to play with them. I play drums like I draw, I see patterns in the air, and play them."
While Brown, who lived in America for six years, has always drawn, it was not until she moved to New Zealand 15 years ago following her mother and stepfather that she decided to study fine art at university.
"I’m glad I did."
Having moved around a lot as a child, she has found she enjoys being settled in Wellington.
"I’ve put down roots here and feel very settled."
To see
I See Mycelium/I Hear the Sound of Breaking Glass
Georgette Brown until February 19.
A Mycelium Meal with Georgette Brown, February 10, 5.30pm
Mycelium Observation Walk with artists Georgette Brown and Madison Kelly, Friday February 11, 9am, Orokonui Ecosanctuary
