Animali Domestici (Alicia Lazzaroni and Antonio Bernacchi) is an art and design duo whose projects traverse distinctions between the quotidian, and abnormal, and the dichotomies of the human and nonhuman through an experimental and speculative process. They explore ecology from perspectives of systems theories, design, anthropology, and craft. Their resulting crafted works are often situated in the ecological and relational process of users and materials coming together in alternate and inclusive manners. Bangkok Opportunistic Ecologies is a textile piece that reproduces Bangkok’s urbanity from a python’s perspective. The dominant visual language in the work is based on the research on the painting techniques, major color schemes, or spatial designs in traditional Thai murals. The project also portrays diverse ecospecies other than the python, as well as relations with and around it—the switch of perspective urges against anthropocentric strategies and human exceptionalism. A continuation of previous work, Down the Drain: Tales of Reptile Coordination is a reflection on the role and potential of anecdotal and analytical mapping, focusing on environmental relationships through a methodology of fieldwork based on direct observation. Bangkok urban pythons are again the leading figures to disentangle and defamiliarize a context made of failing infrastructure, logistics of displacement, agile feral ecologies, intertwined human and nonhuman stories, and popular beliefs. As a consequence, the mapping makes use of transcalar methods, multitemporal awareness, and plural perspectives to come together in the constructed space of a visual document.
