Drawing from the symbiotic intelligence of lichen, this work explores the fragile balance between human innovation and ecological resilience. Set within the haunting terrain of the Yorkshire moors, it invites reflection on how future relationships with the natural world might evolve or unravel.
Developed during a design research residency across Keighley and Calderdale with Hebden Bridge Arts, this project responds to the eeriness and vitality of the moorland landscape, a site steeped in both literary history and ecological uniqueness. The residency offered space to explore how this distinct environment has shaped human narratives over time, from the Brontës’ gothic imagination to present-day ecological stewardship.

Rather than document the land directly, my response leans into speculative fiction to reframe this natural setting through a more surreal, unsettling lens. I wanted to confront the tension between human intervention and environmental fragility, using digital media to imagine a world where this balance has faltered.

Through narrative experiments and 3D design, lichen became a symbol of resilience, a living system that has persisted through instability and symbiosis. It offers a way to consider life beyond the human scale, opening up questions about agency, survival, and the voices we fail to hear.

The resulting piece, a short film combining a 3D-rendered creature and a poetic monologue, functions as a research artefact and speculative myth. Written from the perspective of a sentient lichen, the poem tells of a future where human ambition to merge with nature disrupts ancient symbiotic systems. Through the lichen’s voice, we imagine a world thrown into imbalance by misguided attempts at control.

This work asks not just how we might survive in changing ecological conditions, but what it means to listen to landscapes and to nonhuman narratives.

















Hebden Bridge Arts