Is it me, or is it hot in here? A jungle floats in the darkness on three big screens. Each depicts a riot of giant ferns, vine-tangled tree-trunks and sun-struck foliage in layered, dank profusion. With their jumbles of weathered rock, mossy wetness and tropical vegetation, you can lose yourself in these scenes. But, as I look, mist wafts over a patch of dense greenery as if someone out-of-shot were making with the plant spray.
I’m reminded of those unconvincing jungles in movies and on TV, where the plants have been trucked-in from some garden centre warehouse and arranged on set. Only the camera angles and clever editing stop us from recognising the artifice of it all. In the foreground on one of the screens, you can see rivulets crossing what appears to be a floor of waterproof matting. A small puddle is also forming at my feet. Either the film is leaking, though that seems unlikely, or water is dripping from the ceiling. Through the day, I’m told, the water slowly inundates the sheets of metal that cover portions of the floor, but I arrived too early for the flood.
