Art meets horticulture in new Potter exhibition

A new exhibition at the Ian Potter Museum of Art is bringing together contemporary art, horticultural research and more than a century of botanical history.

The Measured Garden, running until September 6, presents new works by Australian artists Keg de Souza and Francis Carmody, developed through an artist-in-residence program at the University of Melbourne’s Burnley Campus.

The exhibition links the artists’ work with research being undertaken for Laak Boorndap, the new 18,000-square-metre urban garden at the heart of the Melbourne Arts Precinct Transformation in Southbank.

Led by Associate Professor Claire Farrell and Dr Dean Schrieke, the Melbourne Arts Precinct Plant Trials are testing which plant species and combinations are best suited to thrive in the future garden.

Alongside the new artworks, the exhibition includes objects from the Burnley Archive, documenting more than 135 years of horticultural history, as well as specimens from the University of Melbourne Herbarium and material from the plant trials.

MAP Co director of programming Sarah Tutton said the artist-in-residence program was designed to create connections between creative practice, ecology and science.

“Keg and Francis have each responded to the research of the Melbourne Arts Precinct Plant Trials in distinct and considered ways,” she said.

Carmody’s work, Compressions, translates data collected through the trials into sculptural reliefs.

Each piece has been cast and carved using experimental materials sourced at Burnley, incorporating abstracted drawings based on the research findings.

“The project mirrors the shared ethos of my studio and the scientific method, where questioning, experimentation, observation and iteration form parallel ways of understanding the world around us,” Carmody said.

De Souza’s Garden of Strategies takes a different approach, using a series of glass slides dedicated to individual plant species.

The works were inspired by historic magic lantern slides held in the Burnley Archive, with text silkscreened onto glass and pressed plant specimens taken directly from the trials.

De Souza said the works combined scientific traits with “folklore, etymology, botanical histories and contemporary research”.

University of Melbourne director of art museums Charlotte Day said the project created an opportunity for collaboration across art and science, museum practices and field research.

“Francis and Keg are the interlocutors, opening up new ways of thinking and working between us,” she said.

The artist-in-residence program is a collaboration between Melbourne Arts Precinct Corporation and the University of Melbourne, with participating artists spending a year working alongside horticultural researchers at Burnley.

The Measured Garden is on display at the Ian Potter Museum of Art at the University of Melbourne’s Parkville campus until September 6.