ArtReview : Landscapes of the Imagination

extract from article:

Did mankind lose Paradise, sell it, or merely throw it away with other disposables of our plastic world? An advertisement David Cotterrell placed in the property sections of three Hampshire newspapers put our island Eden up for grabs, reducing it to the size of a floatation device supporting a white picket fence around a 'For Sale’ sign. Cotterrell’s piece for Exhumed held out more hope: He took as his starting point the plaque in St Mary-at-Lambeth that memorialises Lieutenant Henry Buckley, a victim of Waterloo. Cotterrell then filmed himself – for nine hours, the duration of the battle – lying in the summer grass that now grows over the field of conflict. Forty thousand men were killed or wounded at Waterloo. Fertilising the soil, their bodies were never recovered; it isn't known where Buckley fell. “When David projected the film on Buckley’s tomb, this vision of bringing a lost man back home, if not back to life, touched many people.” says Danielle Arnaud. “They called it the tomb of the future". Art can transform even a battleground into a garden - a virtual garden at least. 

Leslie Forbes

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