A Space and Time outside
Installation and Body of Research 2016 - 2018
The work commemorates the legacy of acclaimed Irish Captain Crozier, a major figure in the exploration of the Arctic and Antarctic regions during the middle of the 19th century navigating the North West Passage, reaching the North Pole and mapping the unknown Arctic.
“The project unearths an outstanding set of historical plant archives (which have never been on public view,) and that represent a time on the planet before climate change started 190 years ago.”
A Space and Time Outside is a work that uses previously unseen archives of arctic seeds and plants discovered in the Antiquities Department of the National Botanic Gardens to present the moment just before the Industrial Revolution that we can no longer return to. Siobhan extracted some 75 seeds from the plant pressings to develop, A Space and Time Outside, with The Millennium Seed Bank at Kew Gardens, to explore the potential life force of these seeds from the Arctic that have not been around for close to 190 years.
The story of the 1845 Franklin Expedition is one that interweaves the work of Siobhan, and she was stunned to discover the second captain on the doomed Franklin ship happened to be an Irishman with a keen interest in botany, Captain Francis Crozier. As if calling from another time, Siobhan found a superb collection of arctic pressings from the 1845 expedition that have never been on public view. The seeds, buried in the Antiquities Department of the National Botanic Gardens, were presumably collected by, or under orders from, Captain Crozier.
A Space and Time Outside
Herbarium constituents, pressed plants, brought back from the 1825 Franklin Expedition. Courtesy of the National Botanic Gardens
Installation shot, Centre Culturel Irlandaise, 2018
The work commemorates the legacy of acclaimed Captain Crozier, who was a major figure in the exploration of the Arctic and Antarctic regions during the middle of the 19th century, navigating the NorthWest Passage, reaching the North Pole and mapping the unknown Antarctic.
Engaging with different environmental narratives on the island of Ireland and beyond, the work engages this spirit of exploration in unknown territories as we seek to imagine the future of our climate.
The Seed Bank in Kew Gardens.
Last year I discovered a set of 190-year-old seeds that came from the Franklin/Crozier Arctic Expedition in 1845. I found them buried in the Antiquities Department of the National Botanic Gardens, Dublin. It is a superb collection of Arctic pressings from the 1845 Franklin expedition.
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The Seed Bank in Kew Gardens.
Siobhan McDonald 2017
These seeds that belong to another time are an important finding as they represent that moment just before the industrial revolution that we can’t go back to.
