Art Of The Day Weekly

#343 - from 24 April 2014 to 30 April 2014

The garden of all sins

CHAUMONT-SUR-LOIRE – Every spring this annual event, the festival of gardens of Chaumont, presents ephemeral compositions on a specific theme. Since 1992, over 600 gardens have been designed by teams that include landscape artists, artists, historians, philosophers, sociologists, musicians, and more. For 2014, the participants shall answer a biblical invitation on capital sins. It is moderated by Paul Valéry’s expression, according to which “the perfection of what is just is due to the good composition of the seven capital sins”. The re-interpretation of a card from hell which Lorenzo de' Medici commissioned to Botticelli, the mention of saint Thomas Aquinas and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, patches of damned flowers (psychotropic and narcotics) or unfortunate love stories of three volcanoes in the Maori culture: gardens are as much food for thought as they are a feast for the eyes. The landscape can combine with art (an ambitious program of installations since 2008) and an environment-oriented turn (night watering by micro-dispersion, manual elimination of weeds, vegetable recycling, or natural mulch). Those who enjoy contemplating these wonders alone now pay the price; indeed, since 2008, attendance has gone from 200,000 to 400,000 visitors.
Festival international des jardins at the Domaine de Chaumont-sur-Loire, from 25 April to 2 November 2014.

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