Arts and culture at Eden
We're home to the Eden Sessions summer music concerts as well as a stunning collection of major artworks.
Discover works from a diversity of grass-root and world-renowned national and international artists across the Eden Project’s 30-acre site in the Outdoor Gardens, Biomes, and Outer Estate.
These broad-ranging installations are inspired by social and environmental narratives such as climate change, biodiversity and the vital relationship between global communities and natural resources.
Driftwood, bronze
These two foals, which appear similar at a first glance, are made from completely different materials. One is made from carefully chosen pieces of driftwood found on the beach, the other is a bronze cast.
Clay, glaze
At the gateway to Wild Cornwall, clay totems punctuate the landscape. From afar they resemble the bright trunks of silver birches. Created by local ceramic artist Jenny Beavan, they’re made from a mix of clays, turning from dark to light at their tips, and are impressed with seeds, unfurling ferns and flowers collected from Eden.
Granite, slate
(Currently closed)
This still, silent and meditative space is made within, and from, the surrounding landscape in the tradition of the land and environmental art movements originating in 1960s America. The beehive chamber, built by local dry-stone hedgers, was constructed from nearly 120 tonnes of Cornish granite and slate.
Mixed media
David Kemp's sculpture takes a look at fossil fuels which provide over 80% of the world’s energy.
Mixed media
Growing out of the landscape of Eden’s Myth and Folklore exhibit, this living sculpture is made of Eden clay, mirrors and planted with grasses.
Greenheart wood
These sculptures started life as trees in West Africa. The tropical hardwood was repurposed from charred timbers after a section of the Victorian docks in Falmouth was destroyed by fire in 2003.
Acrylic paint
These murals were painted in-situ by the Peruvian maestro vegetalista (shamanic herbalist) Don Francisco Montes Shuna and artist Yolanda Panduro Baneo. To the Capanahua, indigenous people of the Peruvian rainforest, vegetalista are said to gain their knowledge and power to heal from the plants of the region. The murals portray different narratives and depictions of the plants that the artists' use, while also exploring the spiritual connection between plants and humanity.
Cork
In the wild, cork oak wood pastures provide a home for Iberian pigs and a variety of bird species. Heather Jansch decided to create life-size sculptures of these creatures out of the very cork that sustains them in the real world.
Copper
The sculptures depict the myth of Dionysus, Greek god of the vines, and his followers, the Maenads, who dance and writhe through the vines beating drums and sounding trumpets. The Dionysian myths are amongst the oldest stories linking mankind with nature. They serve as an insight into ancient civilisations, articulating truths of human nature that resonate with veracity to this day.
Steel, plywood, cedar
Set amongst Eden’s flowerbeds next to the Biomes, Bombus the Giant Bee focuses upon the central significance of pollination in the ecology of plant life: the mutual dependency between plants and their insect pollinators.
Marble
(Currently off due to Covid restrictions)
Water courses through our bodies, our society and our planet. It is our lifeblood, yet is often taken for granted. This drinking fountain is fabricated as the artist’s wife Rebecca, leaning in for a kiss, and playfully spitting water. The sculpture references fountains in classical gardens, where mythological divinities and other strange creatures are turned into whimsical ‘natural’ springs.
Ceramic, robotics, water vapour
A huge ceramic ‘breathing’ sculpture pays homage to one of the world’s smallest but most important organisms: the cyanobacteria. Artist duo Studio Swine wanted to build a monument to these vital but invisible unsung heroes, in the same way as notable people are commemorated with statues.
Granite
Made from a single piece of Cornish granite, Seed is based on the geometric principles underlying plant growth, as is the structure of the Core building itself. This pattern relates to the Fibonacci sequence and the golden proportion and can be seen in pinecones and sunflower heads amongst many other botanical examples.
Reflective film, aluminium, steel frame
Birds Watching is a 40-foot-long sculpture composed of a ‘flock’ of one hundred reflective birds’ eyes mounted on aluminium. The colourful eyes glow – or gaze – back when hit with light, such as a camera flash. Each eye belongs to a species of bird considered endangered by climate change, creating a potent portrait of what we stand to lose.