Across three historic sites in Beaune, TERRA transforms the settings with surprising moments of contemporary art interventions. The French winemaking term “terroir” or connection to the land has been adapted to the curatorial vision of Jenn Ellis and Emie Diamond. Certainly in Beaune, connection to the land is felt everywhere, because as Milena Berman of Hautes Côtes and producer of TERRA mentions to me on the winding drive through the town,
Everyone in the town of Beaune is involved in the winemaking process somehow.
Across the three locations of TERRA in Beaune, there is something new to see and discover. Our first stop is the Résidence de Moyne-Blandin (67 Pall Mall) where sunlight streams through the window, creating striped shadows around the jesmonite columns of Jodie Carey’s “Guard”. In the adjoining room, naturally-dyed plant-based fabric has been quilted together by Johanna Tagada Hoffbeck to create a tent-like structure. With multiple hanging options, specific choices were made with the placement to
minimize sharp peaks of pulling ropes and creating more peace and harmony.
Variable (14 works)
In the Château de Chevigny-en-Valière, multiple rooms are brought to life, each with their own curatorial character. The dented metal of Rebecca Halliwell Sutton’s “Openings (I)” in the kitchen brings back a memory of the clanking of pots that the space would have heard in years past. Other moments are so subtle you can miss them if you’re not looking closely. As we wound our way up the marble stairwell, a lilting voice caused me to pause—I had walked right by “September,” a written and spoken poem by Greta Bellamacina nestled under the stairs. Her work speaks to the elements using metaphor and the exhibition offers a unique chance to experience an audio performance and her written words simultaneously.
In the theatre upstairs, Dahn Vo’s paper installation so seamlessly blends into the room, it looks like it has always witnessed performances there. Another surprise is the chapel across the courtyard where Nino Sarabutra asks visitors to take off their shoes and contemplate how walking on the surface of over 9,000 handmade skulls makes them feel.
Some works use form and color, while others use sound and space, encouraging circulation and movement. There is a commonality with pieces, letting the elements do their own work, leaving a little up to nature. Take Mariana Hahn’s copper and salt piece, which has 12 layers of writing on the copper, from names of women to the poetry of Sappho. The artist grew up near salt mines and her work showcases the fascinating way that salt oxidizes copper and transforms it over time. Single words aren’t legible, but the layers of thinking, memory, and physical response are all tangible.
The artists brought together in Burgundy for TERRA were carefully chosen by the two curators, Ellis and Diamond. The two drew upon their formidable rosters and an open call, which brought talent from around the world to the exhibition.
We don’t want to have a UFO effect, where we come and hover over the town and then leave,
explains Emie Diamond,
We really work to have the connection to the local community, to the land.
To this end, artists represented by local gallery Galerie Divergences were brought together with artists like Nani Wijaya, who is based in rural Bali and had not exhibited outside of Indonesia prior to TERRA.
The sense of “terroir” is poignantly felt in the work of artists who engage with nature as an integral part of their practice. Emmanuelle Rosso uses experimental natural dyeing techniques and sometimes even physically gets in the ocean with her massive dyed textiles. She never starts with a plan, but rather allows the material to reveal to her. Photographer and filmmaker Begum Yamanlar digitally collages photos to create abstract landscapes, evoking the emotions that forces of nature can stir in us, namely excitement and terror. “The sublime: it’s the feeling of being small, but in a good way,” she shares. Anna Blom works between London and Sweden in two very different environments with her canvases outside in the elements. When working on paintings, she places them on the ground outside and allows what she calls the “situational debris” to enter the painting space in an investigation as to how our environment affects our emotional and interior life. On the subject of connection to the earth,
Blom says,
It was really inspiring in Burgundy to see their approach to soil and the idea of the derivatives from the soil you stand on, how living on certain soil affects you and the way you look at things. They are so invested in the soil and the produce it makes. This is how I’m living with my canvases, the soil I’m standing on – all the intensity of the human way of living is put under a microscope. I do believe that wherever you live, it will affect how you ultimately look at things.
The exhibition looks forward to its finissage later this month on the 17th November which coincides with the 164th charity wine auction at Hospices de Beaune, hosted this year by Sotheby’s.
All Photos: James Retief
