Muireann Nic an Bheatha

MUIREANN NIC AN BHEATHA

ABOUT

Muireann Nic An Bheatha is an interdisciplinary artist, material researcher, and technician based between Edinburgh and the Scottish Highlands. Working across biomaterials, natural dyes, scent, installation, and performance, her practice interrogates our relationship with the materials we use in our everyday lives, and explores sustainable alternatives. In her work, process is as vital as outcome, with tactile, olfactory, and gustatory explorations framing her creative inquiry.

Through hands-on exploration of bioregional waste streams, foraged materials, bio-composites, and bio-polymers, she translates complex material processes into open-source guides, practical workshops, and immersive sensory environments.

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Education

Royal Academy of Art, The Hague
Bachelor ArtScience
2017-2021

Rhode Island School of Design
Sculpture (Exchange Semester)
2020

London College of Communication
Foundation Photography
2013-2014

Exhibitions

Glory Mould 2084
Biomaterials prop design for Produced Moon,
St Enoch Centre,
Glasgow (UK)
2026

Dropcity Material Library
Material Sample,
Milan Design Week,
Milan (IT)
2026

Behind the Scenes
Bioplastic Sculpture,
Glasgow School of Art,
Glasgow (UK)
2026

Pigment in Polymer
Bioplastic and natural dyes,
Summerhall Arts Group Show,
Edinburgh (UK)
2025

Layers of Care,
Installation,
Hidden Door Festival,
Edinburgh (UK)
2025

Simple Pleasures
Paintings and Olfactory samples,
Vanity Affair Exhibition,
Edinburgh (UK)
2025

Bioplastic painting
Bioplastic and natural dyes,
Visual Arts Scotland Exhibition,
Dalkeith (UK)
2024

And Sometimes I Just Feel Like Melting
Installation,
EX35 Exhibition,
The Hague (NL)
2023

Kikker 50: De Plasticene
Installation and Performance,
Theatre Kikker,
Utrecht (NL)
2023

(M)eet de Plastics
Installation and Performance,
KABK Graduation Show,
The Hague (NL)
2021

It’s Plastic Bitch!
Installation and Performance,
The Grey Space in the Middle,
The Hague (NL)
2021

Borders
Lecture-Performance,
Centre for Experimental Lectures,
Online
2020

The Plasticene
Installation,
Stedelijk Museum,
Amsterdam (NL)
2019

Patterns of Ebb and Flow
Performance,
Strandlab,
Almere (NL)
2019

Malaria Hysteria
Short Films,
Edinburgh Film Festival,
Edinburgh (UK)
2017

Toilet Talk
Sound Installation,
Paradigm Exhibition of Electronic Arts,
Summerhall,
Edinburgh (UK)
2016

You and Me Being Sad is Trouble
Photography Installation,
London College of Communication,
London (UK)
2014

Workshops

Bioplastics Cooking Workshop
Glasgow School of Art Skills Week,
Glasgow (UK)
2025

Lecture-Performance and Bioplastics Cooking Workshop
Lofoforra Collective,
Czech Republic (CZ)
2023

Bioplastics Cooking Workshop
Dis_Seminar,
Fort de Batterijen (NL)
2022

Bioplastics Cooking Workshop
EcoArts Festival,
Rotterdam (NL)
2019

Bioplastics Cooking Workshop
Stedelijk Museum,
Amsterdam (NL)
2019

Olfactory Workshop
Activism Today Festival,
Groningen (NL)
2019

Awards & Residencies

Visual Arts and Craft Makers Award
Bursary, VACMA (UK)
2025

ArtScience Bachelor Thesis Award
Royal Academy of Art, The Hague (NL)
2021

Manifest Summer Residency
Moose Space, The Hague (NL)
2018

Winner of the Youth Hub Filmmaking Competition
Edinburgh Film Festival (UK)
2017

Beyond Limits, Crossing Borders Residency Artist Residency
Void Gallery, Derry, (IE)
2016

Research

(upcoming) Tactile Archive: Material Exploration at the Margins
ELIA Conference Bienial,
Zwolle (NL)
2026

(upcoming) Colour as Flavour: Natural Dyes, Edible Bioplastics, and the Dining Experience
Bernat Klein Foundation Sumposium,
Belfast (IE)
2026

Team Roséa: Biodegradable Sanitary Pads from Waste Flower Stems
Blue City Circular Challenge,
Rotterdam (NL)
2023

Publications

How to Eat Plastic
Education Guide and Material Research,
Supported by VACMA
2025

How to Cook Plastic
Bioplastic Recipe Book
2025

Touching: A Research Method in Art and Design
Featured Chapter and Interview
2021

Press

Voices: Three Innovators on Using Generative AI for Bio-based Materials Research
Feature & Interview, Materiom
2026

Review: Glory Mold 2084
Exhibition Review, A Young(ish) Perspective
2026

Starch, Gelatine, Glycerine
Material Research Profile, Future Materials Bank, Jan Van Eyck Academie
2024

Talk to Me: Rachel Valinsky on Three New Lecture-Performances
Performance Review (Borders), Artforum
2020

Skills

Material Research
Material Consultancy
Material Archiving
Facilitation
Biomaterial Formulation
Scent Formulation
Waste Valorisation
Lab Equipment
Lab Setup & Design
COSHH & Risk Assessment
Standard Operating Procedures
Woodworking
Lasercutting
Worksheet & Recipe Design
Natural Dyeing
Performance Art
Exhibition Installation
Lecture-Performance
Lab Management
Curriculum Design
Adobe Suite
Multi-Sensory Documentation

Last Updated 14.10.26

Portfolio

1. Regenerative Materials R&D

Regenerative Materials Samples
Material Research & Prototyping
Highlands & Moray, 2025-2026

Throughout the last 2 years I have developed research around regenerative materials utilising bioregional waste streams, food waste, natural dyes and foraged materials. This has led to me creating a range of bio-composites, bioplastics, hand-made paper and naturally dyed textiles.

With this work I am interested in how regenerative materials can reflect the environment they are created in and from and how they can biodegrade in that same environment.

2. Glory Mould 2084

Glory Mould 2084 Installation, with Produced Moon
Biomaterials Prop Design
St Enoch Centre, 2026

I developed the biomaterial tendrils to represent the AI chatbot ‘Glory Mould’ for the installation created by Produced Moon.

Over 50 metres of Agar bioplastics were created for the tendrils alongside recycled paper and cellulose sculptures and a bioplastic ‘slime’ from tapioca starch. All materials were coloured with natural dyes (turmeric, paprika, curry powder).

3. Composition in Beetroot, Turmeric and Onion Skin

Behind the Scenes Exhibition
Sculpture
The Glasgow School of Art, 2026

This work recreated Mondrian’s paintings using methycellulose bioplastic and natural dyes extracted from waste beetroon, turmeric and onion skins. Exhibited at the ‘Behind the Scenes’ Exhibition at Glasgow School of Art: tsdexhibition.cargo.site

4. How to Eat Plastic

Edible Bioplastics & Multi-Sensory Research
Publication
2025

An Artistic and gastronomic research project examining our relationship with synthetic plastics and the possibilities of bio-based alternatives. The project translates the chemistry of plastic into a speculative menu using food-grade biopolymers, fermentation, and food waste-derived materials and natural dyes.

Rather than offering solutions to plastic pollution, the publication documents these recipes to explore how bioplastics can function as edible, single-use alternatives and provoke new ways of thinking about waste and material reuse.

5. Layers of Care

Hidden Door Festival
Installation
Edinburgh, 2025

This piece was created in response to the location of The Paper Factory, where it was exhibited during Hidden Door Festival. The installation responded to the industrial nature of the site by reclaiming the space through slow, ritualistic material creation.

The process of making the piece was projected onto the work itself, inviting the audience to immerse themselves in the biomaterials and reimagine material production as a ritual of resistance to industrial modes of production, foregrounding fragility, labour, and experimentation over control.

6. Bioplastics Cooking Workshop

Collaboration with Lofofora Collective
Lecture-Performance and Workshop
Brno, 2023

Commissioned by the LOFOFORA collective, this Bioplastic Cooking workshop was part of an experimental dinner and club night where participants engaged with bioplastics through performance, discussion, and hands-on making. The evening featured a lecture performance exploring the history of synthetic plastics, the possibilities of bioplastics, and speculative plastic futures.

Attendees took part in a tactile experience by creating, decorating, and tasting their own bioplastics. By engaging directly with these materials, participants were invited to reconsider their relationship with plastics, blurring the boundaries between consumption, creation, and transformation.

7. And Sometimes I Just Feel Like Melting

Collaboration with Lofofora Collective
Installation
Brno, 2023

Developed for an experimental exhibition organised by the EX35 collective focused on the sense of touch in art, this interactive installation invited participants to engage directly with bioplastics. Hung throughout the space, the bioplastic sheets became a tactile medium that visitors were encouraged to melt and pull on over the course of the evening, continuously altering their form and creating an evolving environment.

As the bioplastics were heated and melted, holes and gaps emerged while filling the room with the distinct scent of the transforming material. Through this shared destruction and reshaping, the installation made the physical breakdown and life cycle of the material directly visible to the audience.

7. Bioplastics Workshop

Dis_Seminar Publication Presentation
Workshop
Fort de Batterijen, 2022

Developed for an experimental exhibition organised by the EX35 collective focused on the sense of touch in art, this interactive installation invited participants to engage directly with bioplastics. Hung throughout the space, the bioplastic sheets became a tactile medium that visitors were encouraged to melt and pull on over the course of the evening, continuously altering their form and creating an evolving environment.

As the bioplastics were heated and melted, holes and gaps emerged while filling the room with the distinct scent of the transforming material. Through this shared destruction and reshaping, the installation made the physical breakdown and life cycle of the material directly visible to the audience. Read the publicationg here.

8. Kikker 50: De Plasticene

Theatre Kikker
Installation & Performance
Utrecht, 2022

For Theatre Kikker's 50th anniversary, I built a live iteration of De Plasticene inside a glass shipping container on the streets of Utrecht. Over the course of the exhibition, passersby watched the space constantly change as I cooked new bioplastics on site, added them to the installation, and used heat to melt down existing sheets.

The location of the installation meant that people communting to work or having their morning coffee could observe how the installation changed, with children finding particular joy in the colour and tactility of the materials. This installation served as an introduction to bioplastics as a material for many people, and brought them closer to the act of material transformation.

9. (M)eet de Plastics

KABK Graduation Festival
Installation & Performance
The Hague, 2021

Marking the culmination of three years of research and experimentation with bioplastics, this performance and installation explored a speculative future where plastic permeates everything, including the human body. Expanding on my thesis, the work treats plastic not as a fixed object, but as a material in a constant state of flux, being created, degraded, and transformed daily, whether by people or environment.

The exhibition space was set up as a cross between a laboratory, a workshop, and a kitchen. During live performances, I cooked, melted, and ate bioplastics in front of the audience. Between performances, visitors could move through the space to touch the materials, ask questions, and cook bioplastics themselves, allowing them to to become entangled in these materials and reimagine what plastic is and what it could be.

10. It’s Plastic Bitch!

Actie! ArtScience Graduation Showcase
Performance
The Hague, 2021

Presented as part of the ACTIE! group exhibition at The Grey Space in the Middle, this performance explored living in a plastic world as a plastic girl.

The was split into three acts, soundtracked by three songs which schowcased 1.Slow, ritual material creation, 2. Plastics entanglement with the body and 3. Full acceptance of a plastic existence, where the palstics were worn, eaten and spread around the exhibition.

By using pop music, absurdity, and raw material handling in full view of the street and the audience, the piece leaned into what it means to inhabit, ingest, and embody plastic.

10. De Plasticene

Rethinking Bauhaus Exhibition
Installation
Amsterdam, 2019

Presented as part of the Rethinking Bauhaus exhibition at the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, De Plasticene explored material cycles, ephemerality, and decay through bioplastics and kombucha leather.

At the center of the installation hung a curtain crafted from the remnants of a bioplastic dress that had gradually disintegrated over time, embracing breakdown as a core property of the material rather than a flaw. Beside it, a dining table invited visitors to interact with plates and cutlery made entirely from edible bioplastics. Functioning simultaneously as tableware and food, these objects blurred the line between use, consumption, and waste.

By treating plastic as something temporary, edible, and constantly in flux, De Plasticene proposed an alternative material reality, one where objects are defined not by permanent waste, but by continuous cycles of use, decay, and renewal.

11. Bioplastic Cooking Workshop

Rethinking Bauhaus Symposium
Workshop
Amsterdam, 2019

Facilitated as part of the Rethinking Bauhaus Symposium at the Stedelijk Museum, this workshop framed bioplastic formulation as a culinary, performance-led experience centered on creating edible, 'disposable' tableware.

Taking on the role of chef, I guided participants through selecting and mixing custom bioplastic recipes to form their own plates. Once cooked by myself, the warm bioplastics were served back to participants to decorate and season, whether this was by taste, aesthetics, or a mix of both. By turning the plate into both the object and the food itself, the workshop encouraged speculation on the future of plastics and alternative ways of creating and disposing of materials.

12. MAAT Cosmetics

Olfactory Art Research
Participatory Performance
The Hague, 2019

In collaboration with Kiara Ama Jade

Created in collaboration with Kiara Ama Jade, MAAT Cosmetics examined Dutch colonial history and lived experiences of racism in the Netherlands through sound and smell.

The performance centered around an olfactory 'gift box' containing custom scents, each paired with a specific audio track. During the performance, participants listened to the narrative recordings while interacting with the corresponding scents in the box. By weaving together scent and sound, the project used sensory triggers to unpack complex historical narratives and personal testimonies.