RETURN TO RECENT WORKS
THE FLAX SOWER, 2021
Details
The Flax Sower, Dig
Watercolour on flax tow paper
The Flax Sower, Rake
Watercolour on flax tow paper
The Flax Sower, Sow
Watercolour on flax tow paper
The Flax Sower, Riddle
Watercolour on flax tow paper
The Flax Sower, Water
Watercolour on flax tow paper
The Flax Sower, Weed
Watercolour on flax tow paper
The Flax Sower, Pull
Watercolour on flax tow paper
The Flax Sower, Ripple
Watercolour on flax tow paper
The Flax Sower, Winnow
Watercolour on flax tow paper
Photography: Keith Hunter & Sally Jubb
Links
Art Lates - 2 (at 44 mins)
Patricia Fleming Projects
Botanics
Doris Press Review
Hyperallergic Review
Map Magazine Review
DESCRIPTION
An exhibition of new works exploring the lifecycle of flax (Linum usitatissimum) and considering the symbiotic nature of its nurture, evolving the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh’s 350-year relationship with the plant.
Spun flax fibres produce linen, one of the most ancient forms of textile. Prized too for its seeds’ medicinal properties, flax featured in Hortus Medicus Edinburgensis, the first catalogue of a plant collection in Scotland, which listed 3,000 plants growing at Edinburgh’s Physic Garden in 1670 – later to become RBGE. In 2021, Borland planted flax at RBGE, continuing the contemporary and historical cycles embedded in this project. In Relation to Linum is an intimate reconnection with the ecological heritage and future of growing and making practices, and their associations with care.
Extract from RBGE Guide
The Flax Sower
A series of watercolours developed from the artist’s recreation in the studio, of the purposeful movements encountered in her first experience of growing flax from seed at home and in Huntly during FLAX research in 2019. Focusing on movements associated with plant husbandry offered a recovery of rituals connecting sustaining, sustainable practices inherent in the cycles of growing and nurturing plants to heritage, present and future ecology. The series of watercolours incorporate an image from the RBGE archives at the heart of the figure; a pre-1859 teaching diagram of a cross section of the ovary of Linum Usiatissimum, common flax in fruit. During the exhibition the flax growing in the gardens was harvested and brought in to the gallery in bunches to dry throughout the rest of its’ duration.
