Welto and the Sacred Bush

Das sagt der/die Veranstalter:in:

Welto and the Sacred Bush brings this knowledge into conversation with contemporary artistic practices. Across sound, soil, story, textile, and living matter, works by artists from the Caribbean and its diasporas explore the sacredness of the bush, the quiet intelligence of plants, and the relational futures rooted in Caribbean gardens—once systems of survival, now models for repair.

Welto, from Creole, refers to what escapes the eye—fugitive forms of life, survival in shadow. The sacred bush evokes healing cultures passed down through land and lineage. Together, they offer a framework for rethinking how we live, relate, and care.

This exhibition is grounded in a two-year collaboration between Spore Initiative and Permactivie, a Martinique-based association that weaves together permaculture and artistic practice through the values of koudmen—mutual aid, earth care, and collective abundance. As part of this collaboration, Grenn Mawon, Permactivie’s educational program, invited 37 children from École Clémence Caristan in Le Prêcheur to become “guardians of the garden.” Guided by artists, herbalists, and musicians, they explored ancestral knowledge through drawing, ritual, and land care—learning not only what has been inherited, but how to grow it forward.

Their contributions appear alongside reinterpretations of Lasotè, Martinique’s communal agricultural tradition, and sonic works echoing bèlè rhythms and conch shells. Mycelium grows and decays. Guardians take shape in drawings and papier-mâché. A child speaks with a tree. And somewhere, between damage and renewal, a garden begins again.