Metodología EcoMat: creación artística de materiales emergentes biobasados (MEB)

In the post-pandemic context, characterised by the resurgence of formalism and performative practices within the museum field, this article presents the EcoMat methodology, a strategy for creating emerging bio-based materials (MEB) from an artistic and sustainable perspective. Inspired by the Material Tinkering (MT) and Material Driven Design (MDD) approaches, EcoMat proposes rethinking the relationship between human beings and matter based on an ethics of environmental care, articulating a research-creation model that integrates artistic thinking, material experimentation and knowledge generation. As a case study, the research project Ecología material: biomaterialidades interespecies en el marco de ciencia, arte y tecnología [EcoMat] is examined, in which a methodology is developed that reframes error, contingency and chance as creative drivers. This methodological proposal is grounded in Wilfrid Sellars’ critical realism, in the pedagogical antecedents of the Bauhaus and the Vkhutemas, in the currents of process art and land art, as well as in contemporary collaborative practices. The process combines experimentation with organic waste, the classification of materials by format and the systematic cataloguing of results. The results show that material can act as an active agent in the generation of form and meaning, challenging the traditional creation-application paradigm and opening pathways towards an artistic practice based on the interaction between matter and subject. In this sense, EcoMat introduces a methodological novelty by positioning artistic practice as a space for material and ecological innovation, where aesthetic experimentation is intertwined with environmental, scientific and technological research.