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After Hortus Malabaricus: Sensing and Presencing Rare Plants
This exhibition at the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (RBGE) marks the culmination of a four-year collaboration between Leverhulme Research Fellow Siân Bowen, RBGE and the Department of Plant Sciences, Oxford University. In addition to working with leading UK plant scientists and taxonomists, Siân's residency in a remote area of moist deciduous rainforest, Kerala, facilitated her discussions with conservationists, botanists and ‘forest gardeners.’
Medicinal plants brought from India to Edinburgh by Scottish surgeons during the 19th century; the extraordinary 17th-century illustrated treatise on plants of Malabar (current-day Kerala), Hortus Malabaricus and living specimens in protected forests and coastal regions of Kerala have all offered rich sources for enquiry.
The rarest plants detailed in Hortus Malabaricus have been interpreted through drawings, videos, sound pieces, artist books, models and casts. These works form ‘collections’ which reflect contrasting phenomenological encounters in darkened herbaria, and sun-lit forests and mangrove swamps. They invite audiences to consider the fragile nature of plant life, the role of a herbarium and the urgent need to protect our natural world – and seek to make present the imperceptible nature of the vulnerabilities and resiliencies of rare plants. Until 22 March. More information.
Image below: Siân Bowen, Gathered Notes: Encounter, 2019, Still from video, UHD, 28 minutes, looped
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