Archival Art Print of "Ictal" by Aurora Levins Morales

About The Work Ictal means being in an epileptic seizure—not the before or after, but the middle of the storm. When I come out of a seizure I’m always left with the impression of intense light. There is a way of blending digital images that is beyond conscious control and produces surprising new results. One day, blending a hospital photo of myself with electric leads all over my head, and an upside down tangle of botanical garden plants, this image appeared and I thought, “This! This is what’s it’s like during a seizure.” About The Ferment Series My multi-genre project, Ferment, explores the impact of “chemicals of control” starting with my own pesticide-induced epilepsy and expanding into a global story of military and agricultural toxicity. My work, in words or in visual art, never documents the terrible without offering some medicine for it. In this case, it’s an immersion into microbiology and the beneficial bacteria that can bioremediate everything from the pesticide dieldrin, to plastic waste, to the residues of war.