TENT presented the first solo exhibition of Pilar Mata Dupont in the Netherlands. In three theatrical video installations she depicted the dormant presence of colonial histories in contemporary culture and in the natural landscape. Invasive plants, dormant seeds, the red soil of Western Australia and a tap dancer played the leading roles.
Undesirable bodies
A monumental video triptych immersed the viewer in an oasis in the Australian Pilbara desert, in which water lilies play the leading role. Since these plants were transplanted by British colonists, they have overgrown the only freshwater source in the area, which is sacred to the original Yindjibarndi inhabitants. Today, the water lilies are the showpiece of the colonial garden, which is famous for its picturesque beauty. But they are also invasive European exotics, which pose a lasting threat to the ecology and culture of their land. Rangers and the Yindjibarndis have to keep the plants in check. With alienating images, Mata Dupont makes it tangible how conflicting values and realities rub against each other in a single landscape.
Shuffle
In a spectacular panoramic video installation measuring almost 15 metres wide, Mata Dupont introduces a masked tap dancer in a setting of fragile porcelain on plinths of red earth. Tap dance is closely linked to a layered history of violence and cultural appropriation: from forced entertainment for slave traders, it has spread globally via African diaspora culture, jazz, Irish step dance and popularisation by white Broadway shows and films. The choreography symbolises how culture remains in motion: as the dancer increasingly bravuraly finds his way between the fragile constructions that surround him, the impact on his surroundings is inevitable. The plinths of earth eventually collapse, forming a symbolic new, fragmented landscape.
The Ague
Mata Dupont's latest work revolves around the London Botanical Gardens, which were built in the 19de century, were the nerve centre of the British Empire. Here, they studied how plants from across the empire could be economically exploited. Today, it is these same gardens that, with the world’s largest seed bank, store the most endangered wild plants for future use. Mata Dupont takes the viewer into this world through a story by Virginia Woolf, in which Londoners wander through the gardens in a dreamy state of semi-consciousness. In her adaptation, the scientific claims of the gardens take on increasingly irrational aspects, in which truth and disinformation, colonial history and our ecological future become intertwined.
Pilar Mata Dupont
Pilar Mata Dupont (1981) is an Argentinian-Australian artist, who lives and works between Rotterdam and Perth, Australia. She is trained in both music theatre and visual arts.
Credits
The works on display would have been unthinkable without the permission and support of the Yindjibarndi and Badimia peoples.
Thanks to Yindjibarndi Aboriginal Corporation; the Department of Parks and Wildlife, WA; the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew; the Millennium Seed Bank; Wexner Center for the Arts, Ohio, USA; the Department of Local Government, Sports and Cultural Industries, Western Australia; FORM Gallery, Perth; Bright Yellow Productions; Transport for New South Wales and Cultural Capital as part of the Wynscreen programme, Sydney; Mondriaan Fund.