At the Mt. Scopus Botanical Garden The Hebrew University in Jerusalem
Location: The Hebrew University in Jerusalem The Mount Scopus campus – the entrance tunnel
Materials: Earth colored stucco, pigments, stone, water system
Dimensions: 24 m long 2.5X2.3 m rectangular tunnel
Project History: 2007-2008 - planning, infrastructure & systems, creation of the stone channels and stone floor, covering with earth colored stucco, painting 8 frescoes of root systems.
Key Meanings: Painted root systems of eight of the garden’s trees, sound of running water, “…the root which works into the earth, belongs to the moisture and to the darkness… life is unable to work at the surface.. the whole activity of life requires a covering…” Goethe
Artist Statement: the concept of ‘enrooting’ (enracinement) occupies a central place in the conservation project I created for the garden. Painting frescoes of root systems was one of the first ideas conceived for transforming the concrete tunnels at the garden’s main entrance… But roots and enrooting, which belong to the hidden activity of plants – that which enables their visible flowering and growth – are not only botanical terms. Enrooting is also a fundamental need of the human soul. Are we to forgo, in our digital-global world, this delicate complex need of establishing connections with a place? …” Ran Morin at the re-opening ceremony of the Mt. Scopus Botanical Garden, 25.11.2008
Preparatory drawing for the rehabilitation of the Botanical Garden entrance tunnel – Ran Morin 2004
‘Root Systems’ ; Frescoes depicting the root systems of eight local trees
(Acacia radiana, pine, oak, carob, olive, cypress’ fig and almond) were painted along The main entrance tunnel to the garden. The paintings are incised into the specially prepared earth-colored stucco.
Preperatory drawing for the fresco depicting the root system of an almond tree – Amygdalus communis photo of almond tree roots in the archaeological site of Ramat Rachel
Preperatory drawing for the fresco depicting the root system of a Cypress tree – Cupressus semprevirens photo of cypress tree roots in northern slope of the Botanical Garden
