Talks

Garden/Art/Garden | The Japanese Garden as a work of art — the modern era

17 Nov 2026, 6:30pm - 7:30pm

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Home > What’s on > Garden/Art/Garden | The Japanese Garden as a work of art — the modern era

17 Nov 2026, 6:30pm - 7:30pm

Garden Museum

Booking information

£20 Standard
£15 Friends
£15 Young Fronds
£10 Student
£10 Livestream

Book Tickets BOOK LIVE STREAM

Is Japan still a place where gardens are understood as deeply spiritual, philosophical and aesthetic practice — far more than horticulture? This session brings together Dan Pearson, one of the UK’s foremost landscape designers who has worked extensively in Japan, and Haruko Seki, a multi-award-winning Japanese designer based in London whose gardens express a sensibility of impermanence and quietness.

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This series, chaired and curated by landscape historian and critic Tim Richardson, aims to broaden our ideas of what gardens, landscape and place can mean in the context of artistic practice in an era of climate change. Across five evenings, Tim has invited a range of practitioners, curators and academics to discuss their own work and to reflect on the broader scene. Each evening will close with a period of socialising (a drink is included in the price of the ticket) so that the discussion can continue. Book for all five evenings at a reduced price here.

Speakers

Tim Richardson

Tim Richardson is the author more than 25 books on landscape topics including the contemporary scene. In his work he has always operated at the intersection of art and the garden. He is currently art critic at The Idler and also continues his work on gardens and landscapes, which have included books on the work of Tom Stuart-Smith and Martha Schwartz, and a genre-defining work on landscape conceptualism entitled Avant Gardeners. He was founder and director of the Chelsea Fringe Festival.

Dan Pearson

Dan Pearson trained at the RHS Gardens’ Wisley and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. 

Starting his professional career as a garden and landscape designer in 1987, he was one of the earliest contemporary practitioners of naturalistic perennial planting in the UK. 

Dan was awarded an OBE in 2022 for services to horticulture. 

Photo by

Haruko Seki

Haruko Seki is a multi-award-winning Japanese landscape designer based in London. She explores the relationship between nature, memory and cultural perception, creating gardens that express the Japanese sensibility of impermanence and quietness. Since exhibiting at the Chelsea Flower Show in 2007, she has lectured internationally and participated in symposia.