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The Botany of Death, 2019
UTS Gallery, Sydney, Australia

In collaboration with Urtzi Grau, David Aznar and the tutors of 2nd-year History and Theory: Anna Tonkin, Zoe Horn, CC Williams, Rowan Lear, Beatrice Myatt, Jack Cooper, Isaac Harrison, and Greta Hauer.

Photography: Hamish McIntosh



The obituary, viewed through the lens of a fictional essay, can be likened to the botany of death. Initially, there was no distinction drawn between the typology of the essay and that of the obituary. The typology of the fictional essay, with its political structures, intersects with the typology of the historicist obituary, marked by nonlinear acts, a central protagonist, and the use of ink and political materials. These obituaries possess the ability to reject the worship of idols and reinterpret discourses of the past within the depths of knowledge.


The botany of death serves as a metaphor for the transition between two conditions, the boundaries of which are not clearly defined. Obituaries, resembling facsimile copies, symbolize the enduring relationship between the collective body of knowledge and its facsimile reconceptualization. Consequently, allusions to the Aldo Rossi palimpsest are relevant not only to the exhibit itself but also to the publication and the obituaries.

The typological form of the obituary is characterized by linear sentences punctuated by political intentions. Obituaries are arranged along both sides as the pages unfold. The sentences, with their arched sheets, manifest on the canvas of your imagination. Their evolution encompasses three levels: words, things, and subjectivities. These structures primarily serve as repositories for collective bodies of knowledge. Access to the content is facilitated through the realm of sensory experience.