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Silver Carlsson

The History of Monstera Deliciosa


The Stone Age Room at National History Museum in Sweden, 1943. Photo courtesy of Vitterhetsakademins arkiv The Stone Age Room at National History Museum in Sweden, 1963. Photo courtesy of Vitterhetsakademins arkiv

Residency, Installation and performative lecture, 2014. 

The History of Monstera Deliciosa was a site specific installation at the Swedish History Museum that consisted of: two photographs showing a Monstera plant at the Museum in 1943 and 1963, a Monstera plant from the Museum’s office and an essay. The essay discussed the museum’s ambitions to construct a linear view of history, in relation to the global history of the Monstera Deliciosa – an imported plant originating from South America. An important perspective was the metaphorical meaning of the “monster”, a creature in European cultural history, that has often marked the border between the known and the unknown, the categorized and the non categorized.

The work was developed in spring 2014, within the framework of the project Contamination of Evidence, a collaboration between Art Lab Gnesta and The Swedish History Museum in Stockholm. The work was presented in a week long exhibition at the history museum.