Grove 2.0 - Chapel of Wild Wisdom

For the outdoor exhibition Disruption: Remapping Nature, Venus Jasper designed a garden in and around a dome-shaped greenhouse, inspired by both druidic ritual gatherings and the permaculture movement. Since ancient time, wise (wo-)men of the woods have come together to learn from Mother Nature, meeting in forest clearings that were considered sacred in pre-christian cultures and later. The outdoor installation functions as both a greenhouse for (local) herbs & poisons as well as a space for meditation and self-reflection.
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The dome, made of branches, wood and sheets of plastic, contains varieties of wild plants found at park De Oude Warande (Tilburg, NL). Seeds have been sown, cuttings planted, paths and seats created. The artist promises that this special space in the woodlands will evolve organically throughout the course of the exhibition and will also host several meditation groups. Grove 2.0, Chapel of Wild Wisdom deliberately creates a cross-pollination between practices and styles of paganism and folklore and an agricultural vernacular: a proposal that turns a greenhouse into a sacred meeting place.
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Like Venus's whole oeuvre, the project is in line with many modern tendencies to re-install a balanced and intimate relationship between humans and the earth, which according to the artist is an ongoing re-vamping of our ancient matriarchal nature path moving through the undercroft of capitalism like a Deep Green Virus.

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• Grove 2.0 was part of Disruption: Remapping Nature, Tilburg (NL).
• Grove 2.0 was shown at DISRUPTION - REMAPPING NATURE in Tilburg (NL) alongside of works by Lionel Estève (FR) – Sven Fritz (NL) – Paul Geelen (NL) – Henrik Håkansson (SE) – Antti Laitinen (FI) – Zeger Reyers (NL) – Martin Schwenk (DE) – Egied Simons (NL) – Maarten Vanden Eynde (BE).
• Grove 2.0 - Chapel of Wild Wisdom is published in the wonderful Delirious Lustwarande - Excursions in Contemporary Sculpture III (2019), a book that features artworks shown at the Lustwarande between 2015 and 2018. The book features essays by Dominic van den Boogerd, Johan Pas and Domeniek Ruyters.
• Grove 2.0 was featured in Metropolis M (2017), Tubelight and twice in the NRC Newspaper: Niet-menselijke krachten op de Lustwarande (04-08-‘17) and De schoonheid van een Slakkengang (27-07-‘17).
• The installation was also the site of the performance Gratitude - Watering the Woodlands.

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