The Silence of Growing Things Exhibition

This exhibition features the works of London-based artists Freya Gabie and Arjuna Keshvani-Ham. Both artists recently participated in Artcore’s international residency in Bengaluru, India, where they explored the city’s botanic gardens and colonial history through the lens of the Indian historian and curator, Suresh Jayaram.

In this exhibition, Freya has responded to the Lalbagh Botanical Garden in Bengaluru, Derby Arboretum and the ancient Nallur tamarind grove (the first protected site of biodiversity in India not far from Bengaluru) by exploring themes of post-colonialism, ecology and place. Gathering disparate voices and histories – archival material recording the transportation of plants between India and the British Empire, Ayurvedic medicinal practices, and fruit sellers in Bengaluru and Derby – her work attempts to reveal the entangled and complicated relationships between people and plants. Three gardens, each differently impacted by imperialism, capitalism and migration, are considered through the lens of resistance, resilience and healing. 

Arjuna, on the other hand, has reacted to the Lalbagh Botanical Garden, and Cubbon Park in Bengaluru and Kew Gardens in London. Her multimedia installations contemplate the colonial infrastructure of the garden – the garden as a space of exclusivity, extraction, instruction, categorisation and nurtured difference. The works examine the ways in which the design of the colonial garden creates an experience of nature which is reflected in the city beyond its walls, in its very structures and architectures, and in the complex networks of authority bound by the tech-fuelled economy which defines Bangalore today.