Entangled Garden for Plant Memory – A Solo-Exhibition of Janet Laurence

“In my depth I’m indistinguishable from the world” – Merleau Ponty

Entangled Garden for Plant Memory – A Solo Exhibition of Janet Laurence is an exhibition that features a creative encounter between art and science; it is also artist Janet Laurence’s first solo exhibition in Taiwan. With diverse methods, Laurence continuously explores the interrelations between different species in nature, creating a wide range of works by employing painting, installation, video and oftentimes natural elements – animal and plant taxidermy specimens, living plants, dead trees, seeds, minerals and earth – along with many instruments used in scientific research. She has collaborated extensively with various natural history museums worldwide, diving deeply into the museum collections while working with museum experts and curators. In this exhibition, she delineates the fragile, precious balance between human beings and natural environment, and reminds her audience that it is quintessential that we maintain the ability to establish relations with other members in the community of life to appreciate their beauty.

The artist uses “garden” as a metaphor to express her view about the cosmos, in which all living creatures converse, engage and communicate through an intricate network. Plants in this exhibition refer to nature as well as the planet’s environment; they have witnessed environmental vicissitudes on Earth, the life of countless species and human being’s actions of plundering and repaying. Possessing awareness and agency different from and surpassing human experience, the memory of plants hints at the entangling relations in nature. From geological formation, habitat ecology, human cultivation and development, scientific gathering and collecting, colonial history and politics, research and education, and passing down the legacy of knowledge, every aspect affects one another and involved in this evolving process.

This exhibition also marks a collaboration of various collections, including the NTU Museum of Zoology, TAI Herbarium of NTU and NTU Geo-specimen Cottage, all part of the NTU Museums, as well as the Endemic Species Research Institute, Council of Agriculture, Executive Yuan. When the first higher education institution was established in Taiwan, it launched the journey of life science research and the collection of specimens. These specimens have formed a solid foundation that supports research and education, serving as a vehicle that helps pass on human being’s exploration of and knowledge about nature. Laurence’s work deconstructs the system of classification while reinterprets the history, origin and meaning of the collections. With the artist’s experience as a point of departure, the exhibition not only foregrounds the beauty of Taiwan’s forest and mountain ecology, but also explores the universal thirst for understanding and interacting with nature.