A Threatened Landscape | Cristea Roberts Gallery
I came across Miriam de Búrca’s small gold-leaf-on-glass works, of dead trees in a group show at Cristea Roberts. The conceit of the exhibition is ecological disaster. Accordingly, de Búrca sees this series, which portray skeletal trees, as reflecting the “existential reckoning” of “our current state of systemic and ecological turmoil”. Each of the works on show is titled after the reason the tree died: war, drought, forest fire.
The artist adds: “I am joining in the call to confront this legacy, and ultimately to prompt discussion about where we want to take things from here.”
Sentinel V - Drought (2024)
Which legacy? De Búrca uses the technique of verre églomisé, an ancient artform involving the gilding of gold leaf onto glass. A technique once popular among the feudal upper classes, who coveted gold artefacts.
From which so much exploitation, ecological and human, resulted. And is replicated in similarly environmentally destructive extractive systems for other materials, in other times. A big backstory to these tiny, shiny artworks.
A Threatened Landscape is at Cristea Roberts Gallery (London). 23 October - 15 November 2025