Tamara Henderson: Green in the Grooves

Through paintings, a sound installation and sculptures, Henderson takes us on a sensory voyage of discovery through the natural world

Tamara Henderson: Green in the Grooves, installation view, Camden Arts Centre, London, 6 October – 31 December 2023. Photo: Martin Kennedy.

Camden Art Centre, London
6 October – 31 December 2023

by ROCHELLE ROBERTS

Tamara Henderson’s Green in the Grooves is a deeply sensory experience that considers the ecological world alongside the human one. Like her previous exhibitions, the themes and concerns of the show articulate themselves in the form of characters: The Gardener, The Director, Sound and Light. Each room explores ideas around microbiology, earthworm ecology and decomposition, using the characters as vessels to heighten the viewers’ awareness of these processes and transformations. These newly commissioned works take us on a journey through the undergrowth to understand how non-human life thrives in its many complex iterations. 

Tamara Henderson: Green in the Grooves, installation view, Camden Arts Centre, London, 6 October – 31 December 2023. Photo: Martin Kennedy.

In the first room, a greenhouse dominates the space. Walking around the outside, you get a glimpse of the interior – hanging objects, refracted shapes and sand pockets embedded in the walls. Once inside, it feels as if you have entered somewhere magical, where surfaces shimmer and reflect light. The glass walls are adorned with little hanging trinkets, mirrors, paintings and sculptures. Soil lines the perimeter, with glass and ceramic sculptures planted in it like newly sprouted flowers. Against the cardboard boxes and piles of bricks, these sculptures have the feel of talismans or guardians, enriching the earth, protecting the ecology of the place.

Tamara Henderson: Green in the Grooves, installation view, Camden Arts Centre, London, 6 October – 31 December 2023. Photo: Martin Kennedy.

Each element that forms the components of this greenhouse has a tactility, from the rug made of hosepipes to the snail shells, the wooden panels to the spindly wire hangings. It is difficult not to stretch out a hand and touch these objects. The haptics of the environment encourages the viewer to consider every inch of the greenhouse, to imagine the feel of the objects or the smell of the soil. By looking, you take on Henderson’s character of The Gardener, alchemical in the way these objects are assembled, each with its own place, to create a cartographic eco-system of its own.

Tamara Henderson: Green in the Grooves, installation view, Camden Arts Centre, London, 6 October – 31 December 2023. Photo: Martin Kennedy.

Yet, despite the focus towards the natural, there is unmistakably the trace of the human – on the far wall, an alphabet made out of related materials (the letter D, for instance, made up of stickered dots accompanied by a paper daisy, a silver dolphin, a green die, a little long-necked dinosaur); the hand and feet prints left behind in paint on a glass pane or a painting; the manufactured objects such as beads and charms or small sculpted lungs. It suggests a way for the human and non-human to function within a system in harmony and perhaps reminds us of the importance of nature within our own world.

Tamara Henderson: Green in the Grooves, installation view, Camden Arts Centre, London, 6 October – 31 December 2023. Photo: Martin Kennedy.

The main gallery space is filled with further paintings, sculptures and textiles. Those familiar with Henderson’s output will know of her gift for creating a multimedia ensemble of her work. This includes handmade costumes for each of the four characters displayed spectrally on revolving stands.

Tamara Henderson: Green in the Grooves, installation view, Camden Arts Centre, London, 6 October – 31 December 2023. Photo: Martin Kennedy.

Each looks as if it is made of hand-dyed fabric with subtle adornments that refer back to their character (for instance, The Gardener has packets of seeds placed in their numerous jacket pockets). The walls are lined with paintings in earthy tones, housed in handmade frames that, although organic in shape, reveal the traces of human construction.

Tamara Henderson: Green in the Grooves, installation view, Camden Arts Centre, London, 6 October – 31 December 2023. Photo: Martin Kennedy.

The paintings themselves depict abstract compositions in amorphous swirls that recall trees or plants, or show creatures such as worms and frogs. A recurring motif of eyes in turn highlights the similarities in shape with leaves. This is seen, too, in the greenhouse, where metal glasses have leaves instead of lenses, and where a metal sheet with a pattern of eye/leaf cut-out shapes hangs against one of the walls. Henderson creates an archaeological environment where the viewer moves through the space in a system of discovery. Flickering candles in plant-like holders of glass light the way.

Tamara Henderson: Green in the Grooves, installation view, Camden Arts Centre, London, 6 October – 31 December 2023. Photo: Martin Kennedy.

On the floor, a handmade gnome-like figurine sits with his top hat and coat atop a pile of bricks. In his hands he holds a pot with sticks of incense burning inside. The incense, derived from different plants, including lavender, eucalyptus, verbena and wattle, permeates the gallery with an earthy smell and helps to create an environment that feels somehow otherworldly despite the deep connection to the earth and to the world in which we live.

Tamara Henderson: Green in the Grooves, installation view, Camden Arts Centre, London, 6 October – 31 December 2023. Photo: Martin Kennedy.

Moving through to the sound room, large wooden archways house speakers that play a livestream of worms moving through the soil. When you enter, it is not at all clear what you are supposed to be hearing and this is heightened by the fact that the sound is not easily discernible. Still, because of this, it encourages a slow-paced reflection in which you are forced to listen closely to try to gauge meaning. Part of the significance of this installation is the ability to experience sounds that are alien to us because we would not ordinarily be able to hear them. These speakers, with their wires rooted through the wooden structures, draw a pathway between what lays beneath and above the earth, allowing us a connection with a creature that, ordinarily, seems quite insignificant.

Tamara Henderson: Green in the Grooves, installation view, Camden Arts Centre, London, 6 October – 31 December 2023. Photo: Martin Kennedy.

This exhibition also features a major new film commission that takes inspiration from Canberra, Australia, where Henderson is based. It documents experiments in her garden and studio showing scenes of earthworms tangled in a root-like system, the way light moves across leaves and grass, the spaces between rocks, vegetal matter. We are remined, as viewers, of how we disrupt the natural course of things, but also the cosmology of life and the materiality of our surroundings.  

With its many sensory pulses, Green in the Grooves makes us take notice of the world around us, particularly what ecological systems unfold beneath our feet or out of sight. It asks us to think about our place among the natural world and how we can help ensure its survival.