365 Plants at CASCO

Casco Art Institute in partnership with Hartwig Art Production | Collection Fund 2020/21 is pleased to present 365 PLANTS by Dutch artist Mariëlle Videler at the Travelling Farm Museum (TFM) depot in Leidsche Rijn. 365 PLANTS is an artwork that is part of an ongoing project that consists of 365 BIRDS / 365 PLANTS / 365 INSECTS.  

Mariëlle Videler works across media, creating installations, drawings, objects, videos and performances. Based on the belief that all organisms have equal value, she creates a pathway through the textures of the world. She explores a new, intensive way of feeling, perceiving and acting, identifying herself as a traveler who makes physical, but above all imaginary journeys. For the past ten years she has done extensive research into the knowledge, ideology and craft of Indigenous cultures such as the Colombian Kogi and the Inuit of Greenland. The idea for the long-term project, 365 BIRDS / 365 PLANTS / 365 INSECTS, sprouted from a meeting with artist and plant expert Abel Rodrígues (also known as Mogaje Guiju) in his house in Bogotá in 2016. When Videler saw one of his colorful drawings in the place where he works, she fully realized that he embodies his original habitat, the Amazon socio-ecosystem on the Igaraparaná River, and shares this through his work. “Knowledge is in your canasto,” Abel told her: in your chest along with your heart. 

365 PLANTS is the outcome of a year-long collection of intricate, almost extraterrestrial plants that Videler created not by looking or thinking of a plant, but by using small scissors and black ink to slowly sense the plant. The fragile paper plants seem to float around a large wall that cuts through the bare grey space, engaging playfully with the situatedness of the TFM depot in Leidsche Rijn Centrum. By creating every day and by using direct and elementary techniques such as drawing, cutting and ink-washing, Videler wants to reconstruct the senses. In this exhibition, she shares an imaginary post-human reality with the visitors.

An essay by the artist titled Plant Day is available alongside the installation and provides insight into the happenings of daily life that accompany the making of these detailed and delicate works. Plant Day follows the saga of a backyard magnolia tree’s human-influenced, grim fate and the artist’s committed intervention. The event of the magnolia tree sets the temporality and frame of view that day, and Videler punctuates the narrative with anecdotal observations and interpretations of what she is surrounded by – from art historical references to her ritualistic, embodied practice within her Artist House. She acknowledges the human and nonhuman details that color each day, and that ultimately inform her artistic practice.

Source and more information: CASCO.