BIOCOLOURS 2024

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Biocolours 2024 conference welcomes researchers from all over the world to Helsinki, to share findings of natural and bio-based colourants within the theme of ‘Sustainable Value Chain for Colour’. Biodegradable materials are used to a greater extent, and we need alternatives to the current synthetically produced, oil-based colourants. Biocolours 2024 conference wants to look at bio-based colourants from multidisciplinary views combining research with businesses. We want to open the floor for presentations highlighting the entire value chain from the production of colourants, their applications and design to marketing and even consumer aspects. Session 8: Designing with biobased Colours Keynote Speaker: Karin Altmann University of Applied Arts Vienna, Austria A World of Blue – Dialogues in Indigo Indigo is the only natural dye that can produce a permanent blue on textile materials, a colour extremely rare in nature but associated with the sky and the sea; probably the reason why it has always awakened the longing for the pure, infinite and transcendent in human civilization. Indigo extraction and indigo vat dyeing, which have been used for over 6,000 years, are among the earliest cultural biotechnological processes. Indigo’s distinctive blue has fascinated and inspired artists around the world over time, while also leading to horrific exploitations of people and the environment. Transferring blue to textiles is nowadays related to the use of synthetic compounds made from fossil fuel-derived substances on an industrial scale. Natural indigo makes up less than one per cent of the indigo dye currently produced worldwide, and today's dyeing practices, which are driven by economic interests, hardly allow environmental compatibility to be taken into account. As both an artist and researcher, Karin Altmann explores the question of how a return to natural indigo dyeing practises can be a solution to create a space for cultural, social and ecological responsibility and provide a solid basis for contemporary, sustainable processes in art and design. In her session keynote, Karin Altmann presents examples of her arts-based research projects, artistic dialogues, intercultural and interdisciplinary collaboration and sustainable design processes that explore the history and potential of natural indigo and open up spaces for joint thinking and acting in which indigo is not simply understood as a colour, but as a conceptual space with historical, social, political, philosophical, and spiritual aspects.

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