About

Berbo Studio is the creative project of Erin Berkowitz, an artist, educator, writer, and certified California Naturalist. Her work primarily focuses on utilizing local plants as natural textile dyes, and inhabits the intersection of ecology and creativity, exploring forms of inspiration, connection, and care that can develop when the ancient/timeless relationships between humans and the natural world are rekindled.

As a teacher and guide, Erin leads plant walks, hands-on dye workshops, and other in situ outdoor creative events intended to encourage and deepen our relationships with local ecology, emphasizing stewardship, especially of native plants and the web of beings – including humans – whom they support. In addition to building a bridge between humans and the natural world, her exploration of plant dyes also aims to find common ground between the two presently disparate worlds of art and science.

Collaborating with the plants, water, soil, minerals, and other beings and natural forces around her, Erin’s art practice acts as a link connecting herself and her community to the land, reminding us that humans were once integral keystone species. By working with abundant resources like non-native plant dyes, sunlight, reclaimed minerals, and collected rainwater, she offers a form of symbolic and tangible care for the places and beings with which she co-creates. Her work serves as a reminder that decoding and integrating the deep wisdom offered by plants and wild creatures – their resilience, adaptations, seasonality – will become essential to our survival and thriving in a changing world and climate.