Is the way we care for the land impacting the life of the soil –  and therefore the food we eat?

This question sits at the heart of Margherita Soldati’s residency at Deveron Projects (2024) in northern Scotland, where she explored the caring relationships between people, farmers and soil.

During the residency, Margherita worked with ten local growers – farmers, gardeners and smallholders – documenting their soil care practices through conversations and collaboration. Together, they created a series of Winogradsky columns, using soil collected from each site. These glass jars, activated with added nutrients and light, became living portraits of microbial life, revealing colorful layers of bacteria that reflect ecological processes and histories of care.

Each column embodied a story. The microbes became a script – mapping science, sensory knowledge, felt experience, and intuition into a shared language.

These layered narratives culminated in a collective event, where participants co-created a semi-imaginary map of the soils around Huntly: a spatial-poetic portrait shaped by collaboration, memory, and microbial presence.

The work continued in the form of a publication, ’Good Gut!’, gathering reflections, visual material, and contributions from the collaborators and many others who shaped the process. The result is a give-and-take practice rooted in care, reciprocity and attention to more-than-human lives beneath our feet. More info on the publication coming soon.

The residency at Deveron Projects in Huntly was funded with thanks to Mondriaan Fund.