Tell it to the trees
Left, Bound, Philippa Lawrence, cotton wrapped deceased oak, (photo: Alex Ramsays) Right, To Suspend the Breath, Brass Art, red neon and glass tubing
Art and craft meet horticulture and conservation in a new exhibition at the National Trust’s Croft Castle in Herefordshire (until 15 September 2010)
Tell it to the Trees is a year-long exhibition inspired by trees. It’s been organised by Meadow Arts with the aim of both highlighting the wonderful group of 300 year-old trees at Croft Castle and showing how trees can inspire a range of different responses from artists. Along the way the exhibition looks at issues such as conservation and the impact of de-forestation as well as ideas about the cultural role trees have played. Brass Art looks at the symbolism of trees, exploring the idea of the tree of life with their red neon and glass tubing sculpture To Suspend the Breath. From a distance it seems to be in the shape of a pair of lungs but on closer examination is in a fact a pair of stylised leaf forms – the idea presumably being that trees give us life-giving breath. Mareile Neudecker’s installation looks at the more sinister aspect of trees and forests as home to all sorts of lurking dangers with I Don’t Know How I Resisted the Urge to Run.
Other exhibitors focus more on the actual form and substance of trees – so Philippa Lawrence has covered the top half of a dead oak tree with red cotton, highlighting its dramatically twisting branches, while Laura Ford’s jesmonite Espaliered Girl cleverly echoes the forms of fruit trees trained to grow against garden walls.
www.nationaltrust.org.uk/croftcastle
