Playing Lost and Found in Es Devlin’s Ecological Labyrinth

Devlin, whose broad oeuvre includes stage sets for theater productions like the Lehman Trilogy, a revolving backdrop for Beyonce’s Formation world tour, and the new British Pavilion at Dubai Expo 2020, wants us to dial back our sensibilities to a pre-industrial age when people had a more symbiotic relationship with the natural world. In a video about Five Echoes, she says “the forest is a co-creator of the work,” and encourages visitors “to learn about [the trees], as you would a friend.”

The semi-circular installation—180 feet wide by 205 feet long—is not especially aesthetically striking, but it is relaxing and thought provoking, aside from the loud, somber, and muffled recorded voice  of Devlin herself reciting the names of the plants. More information is available on white plaques that describe the attributes of the various flora and their contributions to the larger ecosystem. One, a jumble of green and brown stems called Fakahatchee Grass, serves as the main food source for the Byssus Skipper Butterfly. Another, the Southern Live Oak, can live for several hundred years and is resistant to Florida’s notorious hurricanes.

The structure at the center of Five Echoes is designed as a labyrinth, an ancient Greek term which according to Devlin was used to describe a dance before it was used as an architectural structure. Its pathways are meant to reflect the spare, geometric designs of the Abbey of Aubuzine in France, where Coco Chanel spent her early childhood. I wandered along the concentric paths, temporarily disoriented by white billowing fabric and loud pop music blaring amidst an overlay of a fragmented and portentous recitation of Baudelaire’s poetry. However, the experience did serve as a visual cleansing or purification, somewhat akin to white balancing a camera. And when I emerged and looked down over the surrounding trees from the labyrinth’s viewing platform, I had a heightened appreciation of the natural beauty in front of me.