FORUM PRESENTATION: IMMEASURABLE LIFE IN THE APPLE ORCHARD
In conjunction to the exhibition Back to basics, artist Frøydis Lindén, also an agroecologist, has invited Åsmund Asdal and Asbjørn Børsheim to talk about how we can help maintaining diversity in our own gardens, with focussing on apples.
A myriad of flora, whether invisible underground fungi or apple varieties adapted to the places we live in, is important for our future. Biological and genetic diversity is a source of work for researcher’s and impacting our ability to adapt to climate changes and need for new types of plants. It’s not necessary, however, to be an expert to keep this diversity alive, it might well happen in your private garden.
In his presentation, Asdal will talk about how and why seeds and living plants are collected from older types of plants and kept in Norway. Nes will talk about historical apple varieties from the West of Norway, and how to prepare a twig from an old tree so that it can be grafted onto a rootstock.
Gardeners who has an old tree they wish to renew can register at hks[at]kunstsenter.no. The registered gardeners will receive information on how to find a healthy twig suitable for grafting, to be submitted collectively to Hjeltnes high school in Hardanger. The grafting will cost NOK 350.
Åsmund Asdal is a senior advisor at The Norwegian Forest and Landscape institute, and works with strategies for preserving Norwegian plant diversity at Norsk Genressurssenter in Grimstad and at Plantearven, a website with information on old varieties of different plants.
Asbjørn Børsheim is an experienced gardener, both as fruit farmer at Hakastad Farm in Ulvik and as teacher and former principal of Hjeltnes high school in Hardanger.The school has one of Norway’s largest collections of apple varieties, with over a hundred old and new types.Børsheim has utilised some of these varieties in his own production with Ulvik frukt & cideri.
Frøydis Lindén has studied ceramics at Hochschule Niederrhein in Krefeld, Germany, and at The Danish Design School, Bornholm, Denmark, and holds a BA in ceramics (2006) and an MA of Fine Arts (2011) from Bergen National Academy of the Arts. Lindén has also studied at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences, from where she holds an MA of agroecology (2002), still influencing her artistic work. Lindén has been involved in several collaborative projects, such as Cupola, with the artist collective Ytter at USF Visningsrommet, Bergen (2010), Rasteplass Nytorget at Rogaland Kunstsenter (2010), the art in landscape project Eksperiment SUS 2 at Prosjekt Alvøen, Bergen (2010) and Eksperiment SUS 3 at Fron-fjellet (2010), Present with the group Før/Nu at Bomuldsfabriken Kunsthall, Arendal (2007), and Living tool at Galleri Korea, Berlin (2007).