An ongoing research into dust and ritual as archive. An urban archaeology. Epochs of toxicity. Generational disease and degradation. Eroding, uncovering, revealing new layers of an old, undocumented history. An object becomes host to coral-like formation of turquoise crystals. Incremental growth of yellow sand mountains. Shifting and changing landscapes. A new man-made nature scripted by subterranean gold. Geological conditions, ecologies, life-forms, urban practices, rituals, rites hybridise and mutate. Stories, practices, myths, legends that establish themselves over generations, appearing in quick flashes.

Viewers are invited to construct their own narratives of image and text – snapshots of a new urbanism developing in Johannesburg’s bufferzones. Objects in the petri dishes set in resin – eggshells from a prayer ritual, acid mine crystal formations, fossilised glass bottle caps from the Joburg water company from 1897. A history rising to the surface with the toxic runoffs.

• Golden Plateaus by Sumayya Vally, e-flux Architecture