Maria Jose Arce

My visit to the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh, in the context of the Plants on Paper Workshop, was an opportunity to intensify the connections I have developed over the years, both with the institution and some of its participants. Under the umbrella notion of decolonising botanical collections — a challenging topic to define, given its global complexity, the workshop gathered artists, researchers and curators from some of the different geographies represented in the RBGE collections.

One of the speakers at the workshop was Turkish botanical illustrator İşik Güner, whose work is broadly featured in Plants and Trees of the Forests of Chile, the first book of a series on the topic, edited by the RBGE. We might ask ourselves: why would a Turkish artist illustrate Chilean flora? And this is where the concept of “decolonizing” begins to unfold. Martin Gardner, a horticulturist who spent most of his life working at the RBGE, has also dedicated much of his career to exploring, identifying, collecting, and preserving Chilean flora. From there, the idea emerged to create a large-format book with high-quality illustrations that would aptly represent the country’s ecological wealth. This ambitious project took over ten years to complete and the book was released in 2022.

At Fundación Chilco, where I serve as Art Director, we are now launching the second volume of this collection, titled Endemic Plants of Mediterranean Chile. This time, Fundación Chilco is leading the project, bringing together ten Chilean illustrators. I find this example particularly relevant in the context of the workshop, as it is a project that began at RBGE, an institution with a longer tradition than any in Chile, and that has now taken flight to cross the ocean and become part of a botanical illustration archive created by Chileans —one that we hope will also be preserved in our own country. At the same time, I believe it is vitally important to share this work with the general public through exhibitions and to provide access to the archives, which we hope will continue to grow over time and be preserved locally. 

As an effort to devise procedures to contribute to the decolonization of its collections and institutional collecting practices globally, the workshop served as a space to learn the value of conservation and archival work; at the same time, it furthered my sense of urgency in ensuring that future conservation efforts remain rooted in the countries of origin. At Fundación Chilco, we hope to continue collaborating with the Botanic Garden, drawing on its experience and support to gain more knowledge and tools in this field. Through this relationship, we seek to develop tools for a meaningful construction of both physical and intellectual cultural ownership.