I have just completed an installation as part of Rocio Jungenfeld and Esra Oskay's project, Weaving Threads, at Lauriston Glasshouse at Davidson's Mains in Edinburgh. My installation, The Collector, deals with the building itself: it is still used, but as a conservation architect, I feel that the rot has set in. This poem is the interpretation for the work.
The Collector
Tired of piercing the bodies of benign butterflies, I laid my gloves aside
and struck out for a new entomology.
To understand this place, this great glazed growing space, its fringes
now green, its edges now mould.
And so I have collected this glasshouse, held its broken body in my
hands, choked on the dust of its wings and pushed the pin through.
Look in here, wear my gloves and leaf through these if you will, study
them and feel the temporal beauty, the past now present.
All bless, Alastair.
