Inner Etnobotanic Cartogrraphy
2025
Oil and engraving on wood, wood and bronze sculpture, wood, soil, charcoal, plants, seeds and dried fruits, ganoderma, stones, water, iron and steel tools
Courtesy C+N Gallery CANEPANERI
Photo credit: Mattia Mognetti
“The title of the exhibition evokes, on the one hand, haunting: the spectrological dimension of what returns in history - what was left unsaid or unresolved; on the other, spells: understood here as transformative acts capable of symbolically affecting reality. This conceptual concatenation emerges immediately in the site-specific installation Inner Etnobotanic Cartography (2025) by Peng Shuai Paolo (1995), which explores the relationship between nature, traditional medicine, and diaspora. The work consists of a constellation of objects and artistic interventions that weave together personal histories, shamanic practices, and herbalist traditions across cultures, with a particular focus on China and rural Italy. At the center of the installation are wooden crates engraved with natural
patterns and bilingual symbols, including the phrase “即可杀既可生 / TO KILL AND TO CURE”, alluding to the ambivalent power of medicinal plants and traditional remedies.
Natural and ritual elements converse with everyday objects and ancestral symbols: from Artemisia verlotiorumharvested and preserved using folk practices, to a bamboo pipe evoking pre–Cultural Revolution China, to a ceramic bowl used as an esoteric device. The presence of anthropomorphic lotus seeds, palm fans, and Moxa sticks triggers reflections on plant life cycles and their therapeutic function. The work is enriched by paintings and engravings depicting glimpses of the artist’s birthplace in Xiangtan, with family portraits celebrating peasant and shamanic traditions, and ancient texts like the Tao Te Ching, here engraved in reverse - resisting the linearity of time and knowledge.”
(Arnold braho, 2025)