In 2020, the paved courtyard garden of Rijksmuseum Twenthe was transformed into a green workplace for artists. Starting in the spring of 2022, we will expand this "green lab" to the back of the museum, where hidden among the oak trees is an old Twente farmhouse and a large garden fallen into disuse. RMT has asked artist Elspeth Diederix to create a new design for the back garden, to revitalise this area and make it accessible to the public once again.
Because of its location between the trees, Diederix soon decided that part of the garden should become a real shady garden. In doing so, she drew inspiration from the 17th-century forest floor still lifes from the collection of Rijksmuseum Twenthe. The painters of these so-called sottobosco-telescences focused their attention on life low down to the ground, under the trees. They painted insects, butterflies and coloured flowers that stand out against the mostly dark backgrounds. In her design for the Sottobosco Garden, Diederix also creates a contrast between the brightly coloured flowers and the dark surroundings.
According to Elspeth Diederix (1971), the world is of infinite richness. It is the core of her artistry to show this richness, the beauty of nature and of ' the things'. She does this by looking at her photographs and searching for the moment when everyday phenomena lose their familiar appearance and only then become truly visible. Diederix studied at the Rietveld Academy and the Rijksakademie van Beeldende Kunsten, and recently took a course in horticulture.
