The right to remain silent
Herbarium Refugium (Dummy)
2025 Lavinia Wouters
Around Dunkirk and Calais in northern France, I followed the traces left by refugees seeking to cross the English Channel.
In the forests, fields and dunes where they hide and wait, the landscape becomes a witness. Trees, flowers, plants and seaweeds silently record the passing of bodies and time.
Photography and botanical research trace, document and analyse both the visible and invisible layers. Native and migratory flora are captured specimens, pressed and carefully catalogued.
Through colonialism, trade, climate change and borders, plants have crossed continents and adapted to new soils. What does it mean to view a refugee camp through the eyes of these plants? What knowledge lies in the silent accumulation of botanical memories? What happens when we look at things more closely, from another perspective?
This is an archive of presence and a silent urge to see what remains unseen.
20 x 28 cm, hand-bound book with 4 different sizes and papers.
Designed by Lavinia Wouters with the support of Tapir Book Design/Ania Nalecka-Milach