< back to archives


August 2009

Over the summer the garden became my second studio. The pull of the outdoors was too much to bear and sitting at a desk to work became a less frequent scenario. There was nothing to do but embrace the situation and I began experimenting with text pieces in the space.​

A poem lurks in the undergrowth and many cress works have come and gone as I literally ate my words.​


The piece specifically made for the even, from around 10,230 seeds, will not last. Before the week ends it will outgrow its form and be rendered unreadable - transformed back into food. The passing of time can be a threatening concept for most of us, yet for a gardener it reaps rewards.​

For the artist it provides a temporary platform through which I can exhibit. I hope to expand the work into a more public arena. Wanstead flats and the forest nearby provide rich pickings for a site and I revel in the thought of a dog walker's random discovery.

The answer to the question posed in the soil

"How do we get to this parallel universe then?" is at once the most simple and most inconceivably complicated. Regailing different responses - the notions of parallel universes or many-worlds can be dismissed as simply absurd but, the what if scenario delightfully tortures us all.

There is only a certain amount of control I can exert over the success of my work in the garden.

Patience and a healthy friendship with frustration are critical. A mischievous squirrel destroyed some of the piece, literally rolling around on the sprouting seeds.​

There are many ways in which the piece could fail; not enough sunshine, too much heavy rain, wind, hungry blackbirds or a curious fox.​

Of course, in one parallel universe it came out perfectly.

How do we get to this parallel universe then?

Cress seeds, sunshine, rain & soil

2009 / All content © Kirsty Harris 2019

  • Instagram Social Icon
  • c-tbird
  • c-facebook
  • linkedin-square