PALUS FLORENS
plasticine, metal frame, soil, seeds, a map, notes, chemical and bacteriological soil analysis results
"Palus Florens" Exhibition
CURATED BY OLGA DERUGINA
PHOTO BY MIKHAIL GREBENSHCHIKOV
Start, WINZAVOD CCA, MOSCOW
2019
Palus Florens (a flowering fence) is a research project about how fences and barriers shape life in a yard: they affect the routes and trajectories of local neighbors, limit communication between species, and shape the landscape. Alina creates graphs of possible crossing points and analyses of the soil in places of encounter. Recording details of the neighbors' routes, the artist marks the places of interspecific interaction on a map of the courtyard. Her interest in the space of the yard grew out of constant childcare and the inability to build new local connections.
The flowers and their location in the courtyard were the basis of the research: Alina sketched them, compared the leaves, photographed them, and analyzed the patterns of movement around them. In the exhibition, the flowers are made of plasticine and places on a pedestal in a shape that replicates flowerbeds. The clay allows the viewers to influence the flowers: by changing their shape while touching, or by minor changes through presence and body warmth. Alina reproduces the relationship between plants, animals, microorganisms, and chemical elements on an example of a Moscow courtyard.
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