Tuija Tapio
The course week was filled with new
places and species. The idea of my art piece started to develop as
the names of the new species I learned during the day spun in my head
when going to sleep. It just so happened that the real names
transmuted into totally new ones mixing real and imaginary names
and words. Finnish language is especially rich when it comes to
naming the species. The next day I really had to concentrate in
connecting the appropriate names into the right plants.
I decided to try to create new plants
with rich and imaginary names. I didn´t have the knowledge or the
time to cultivate the plants really from the beginning and therefore
the visual appearance was enough for me. I for example used iron
wire to add couple of cucumbers into a kale and an apple into an
eggplant. I also used cauliflower with rowan berries and fennel with
potato berries. Plants for the experiment I took from my allotment
garden which is situated close to the Kumpula Botanical Garden.
I wanted to achieve the official
scientific looks for the art piece and decided to built a wooden box
similar to those that are used for useful plants in Kumpula Botanical
Garden. For the same reason I also decided to place my box with newly
crafted species next to Kumpula Botanical Garden´s fence to catch
the idea of scientific cultivation and laboratory circumstances. I
wouldn´t dare to take the art piece inside the garden. I found a
perfect spot alongside the Botanical Gardens fence. One can see the
plants with name tags inside the garden.
The perfect spot had a hole in the
fence. It added one more meaning to the artwork. The hole in the
fence made me think of a prison or carefully guarded scientific
laboratory and possibility to run away from it. The idea reminded me
of the scary stories I´ve seen in science fiction films when
something dangerous, for example diseased animals, gets into the
nature by an accident and causes a lot of destruction. After these
thoughts my created plants transformed into escaped prisoners in my
head. I then decided not to add the name tags in them since it is
obvious that the liberated runaways wouldn´t wear tags anymore.
The hole in the fence made me think
more of the dangers there may be in scientific manipulation of plants
and cultivation. What in the end will happen to us when interfering with the diversity of the nature gets too far? The resources for
cultivation are enormous and the need for efficient food supply grows
constantly. The food industry may use science in immoral ways to
achieve the goal. Financial ambitions may not be beneficial to the nature.
I want to think that my runaway plants
don´t mean any harm for anyone and are just confused from the
freedom. That´s why they just stay in the box close to their
original birthplace leaning on each other.
A great reward from my work was when my
fellow students couldn´t recognize the plants at first glance.
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