Almost Transparent Nature, Elisabetta Di Maggio, Venice.

Seen from the windows of the Museum at the Querini Stampalia Foundation in Venice, the garden is a rectangle of green lawn shaded by a couple of trees and a high, brick, boundary wall covered by dark green ivy. 

Turning your back to the windows, you find that ivy has penetrated the elegant rooms. In the portego, the great hall intended for receptions and entertainment in old Venetian palaces, its green branches bring life under a sumptuous Murano glass chandelier, among marble busts and sofas frozen in a perfect past. The evergreen ivy, promise of a perpetual spring, flows on the floor and covers the walls. Just the Allegory of Aurora, the delicate fresco of the goddess of the Dawn painted on the ceiling, seems to remind you of the passage of time. 

Italian artist Elisabetta Di Maggio  has patiently treated and stabilised the branches of ivy. Their bold green has turned into a soft brown and the leaves, finely cut with the scalpel, have become an intriguing embroidery that, traversed by light, reveals their venations. 






Time, patterns and nets are themes explored in the exhibition with different materials, such as cabbage leaves on a root table, a bobbin of tissue paper and a plaster wall cut with scalpel, or a medical gauze covered with liquid porcelain and then perforated.

In the garden, the day goes on in the heat of the summer day. There are lotus flowers in the small pond, papyrus bending against a stone lion, and the refreshing sound of the water mixed with that of chatting and laughing in the café. 

Photos:
TravelinaGarden, Venice, June 2017

Link:
Elisabetta Di Maggio
Almost Transparent Nature - Natura quasi Trasparente
10 May – 24 September 2017

Fondazione Querini Stampalia | Museo Querini Stampalia
Campo Santa Maria Formosa, Castello 5252 Venice
http://www.querinistampalia.org/ 

Words in pictures: plants, pots and pedestals, Pingyao, China.

Photos:
TravelinaGarden, Pingyao, Shanxi, China, April 2017

The Dutch House: from Amsterdam to the Gardens.

Amsterdam canal, June 2016

Unmistakable silhouettes and varied ornaments feature the traditional houses crammed along Amsterdam's central canals. 
Dating back to the 17th century, they were built by a prosperous bourgeoise that, making the best of the little available space, combined storehouse, office and home in the same building. Facades reflected the different needs: pulleys to hoist up goods, and decorative gables, ornate corniches, and expensive sandstone to show off taste and wealth.  

It was a time of economic and cultural development, and, with the expansions of trades from the Far East to North America, red bricks, large windows, narrow facades and pitched gables were soon seen from Indonesia to New Amsterdam (later New York).

Sometimes, Dutch Houses ended up in gardens too...

Kew Palace, UK,  2015

Kew Palace, Royal Botanic Gardens Kew,  UK 

The fate of this house, built in 1631 by a wealthy London merchant of Dutch origins, changed for ever when, in 1728, Queen Caroline leased it for her three daughters, the Princesses Amelia, Anne and Caroline. Bought in 1781, it was the summer country retreat for George III and his large family. Here, Queen Charlotte, George III's wife, quietly died in 1818. In subsequent years, members of the Royal Family lived in its simple rooms but, never considered among the major residences, it slowly went into decay. Plans to demolish it were taken into consideration but, luckily, never executed. Sold to Kew Gardens in 1896, it opened for the first time as Museum in 1898. Renewed in 2006 with major restorations, Kew Palace is a fascinating and peaceful place to visit while taking a stroll at Kew Gardens in a sunny spring day. 

Babylonstoren, South Africa

The burgher Pieter van der Byl settled at Babylonstoren farm,  near Cape Town in South Africa, in 1692. He planted vineyards, created an efficient irrigation system for orchards and cultivated fields and built barns, granaries and other useful buildings. Their thick whitewashed walls, symmetrical facades, grand gables and thatched roofs are among the best preserved examples of the Cape Dutch style. As the Dutch colony, first established in Cape Town by the powerful Dutch East India Company in 1652, expanded, settlers adapted their European architectural traditions to local materials and conditions creating this unique style. 

Babylonstoren is a charming, elegant place where the historical heritage is valorised by contemporary design and functionality, rich of details and full of surprises, a superb garden, a famous restaurant and little cottages to enjoy and relax surrounded by nature in the Cape Winelands.

The Dutch House, Kuskovo Park, near Moscow, Russia 

The Dutch House, built in 1749, was the first pavilion in the park of this country estate situated around thirteen kilometres south-east of Moscow. It belonged to one of the most rich and powerful Russian families, the Sheremetev, who did not spare money and work to create a convincing Dutch illusion. 

The Dutch House was surrounded by a small Dutch garden and a canal, and its interior was decorated with with blue and white tiles, Dutch paintings and amusing life-size painted figures suitably dressed. 

More examples? Please share! 

Photos:
TravelinaGarden.

painting:
The Battle of Dunkirk, Willem van de Velde (1611-1693) ink on canvas, 1659



Further reading:

Ray Desmond, The History of the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, London, Kew Publishing, 2007 (1995)

Graham Viney, Colonial Houses of South Africa, Struik Publishers 1988

Margarethe Floryan, Gardens of the Tsar, Aarhus, Aarhus University Press, 1996

Links:
Kew Palace, Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, Richmond, Surrey, UK
http://www.kew.org/

Babylostoren, Klampunts Simondium 7670, South Africa
https://www.babylonstoren.com

Kuskovo Estate, Yunosti Street 2, Moscow
http://kuskovo.ru/