Enfants Sauvages

Royal gardens. Apollo striding among temples and soothing greenery, concealing enigmatic tales from courtly life.

The cruel amusements of the aristocracy, entwined with its fascination for wildness and otherness, underpinned by the fear of death at the hands of barbarians. Pleasure and decay.

Queen Louise Marie Gonzaga—herself a highly educated patron of learning—upon hearing the story of a child discovered in Lithuania, allegedly raised in the forest by a she-bear, ordered that this extraordinary curiosity be brought to her court. The boy, however, enjoyed little of courtly life: after the queen's death he was sold and ultimately placed in chains.

Wild children stirred the imaginations of the nobility, already inflamed by myths and legends. The figure of the wild one—the outsider, the nonconforming being—both fascinating and alluring, yet at the same time inspiring fear and revulsion. His body and behaviour were observed and scrutinized, mythologized and demonized.

Corporeality, animality, totems and herms swirling through the heart of a mysterious garden.