Inverleith House & Front Range Glasshouses 29 July – 29 October 2017.

Open Tues – Fri 11am – 5.30pm, Saturday & Sunday 10am – 5.30pm.

Plant Scenery of the World brings together new and commissioned works by contemporary artists alongside archival material and contemporary botanical drawings from the collection of the Royal Botanic Gardens. Charlie Billingham, Plant Scenery of the World, Inverleith House

Presented here, Oliver Osborne and Laura Aldridge investigate plants through the lens of human culture. Charlie Billingham evokes the fervour for exoticism that gripped Britain in the Victorian era whilst Bobby Niven contemplates the activity of the collector and the functions of archives. Finally Ben Rivers’ new film Urth considers false habitats, inhospitable environments and dystopian futures. 

Plant Scenery of the World takes its name from a suite of paintings by artist-botanist R.K Greville (1794-1866) which were intended to introduce Victorian audiences to tropical geographies. Today these paintings appear as anachronistic and apocryphal visions of the exotic seen through Western eyes; perspectives that have come to shape enduring (mis)understandings of other places.

The exhibition celebrates the 50th anniversary of the Garden’s Modernist ‘Front Range’ Glasshouses, designed by architects George Pearce and Allan Pendreigh and opened in October 1967. This vast glass and steel structure was built to house the Garden’s expanding collection of exotic plants and demonstrated a shift in architectural styles that favoured space and light. The expression of this new aesthetic is evident in the detailed and hand drawn plans by the architects. Laura Aldridge, Plant Scenery of the World, Inverleith House

For our programme of events; including tours, workshops and talks, follow this link – Inverleith House Events Programme.

Image Credits;

1. Charlie Billingham, Delft Dancer, 2016; Untitled (Plant Pots), 2017; Untitled (Wall Print), 2017. Courtesy of the artist and Suportico Lopez.

2. Laura Aldridge, SIGNALS AND GET WET, 2016-2017; DISPLAY SCAPE #6 FOR INVERLEITH: DROP.CLOTH (REMOVE SHOES AND COLLAPSE YOUR METONYMIC IMPULSE, REPLACE IT WITH A REFRESHED SENSE OF HOW WE RELATE TO THE THINGS AROUND US) (detail), 2017. Courtesy of the artist, and Koppe Astner, Glasgow. New Planthouses No. 3, c.1965, Diazotype Print. Collection of Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh.