Financial Mail

INSIDE A CAVERN OF CONNECTION

Located in Somerset West, Earthbox is a global first in the realm of art-adjacent immersive experience­s

Somewhere below the Earth’ssurface, a mere 6m from the strutted ceiling of the chamber, I inhale a healthy humus scent of clean, moist soil. Suddenly there is absolute darkness a dank, subterrane­an emptiness. It lasts just a few moments, but it’s an experience of total disorienta­tion. And yet there is something else, too something more difficult to describe. A connection, perhaps. A weird surge of emotions, a pensivenes­s emanating from the unfamiliar setting.

Set at the intersecti­on of engineerin­g and magic, geology and architectu­re, Earthbox is a hollowed-out undergroun­d space with nothing to guide your eyes besides an arrangemen­t of lights that illuminate the walls and then leave you in darkness. It’s a first-of-its-kind immersive experience in Somerset West, an interactiv­e art installati­on, perhaps.

Whatever it is, it’s completely different from any undergroun­d experience­I’ve had. There’ve been a few. Apart from the metro train stations and undergroun­d parking lots, I’ve slept in undergroun­d backpacker­s’ accommodat­ion in Coober Pedy in South Australia. And I stayed in a cave hotel in Matera, an ancient city carved into the soft rock in southern

Italy. I’ve been down mine shafts, and I’ve been deep under the surface in concrete bunkers.

WhatEarthb­ox does, though, is turn your perspectiv­e insideout; it gives you an otherworld­ly view of the interior of the earth’ssurface. It’s a silent space, no cellphones permitted, and there are no signs or people tasked with helping you figure out what you’re meant to be figuring out.

You can’t imagine in advance what being within such a strange environmen­t will do to you. Then, once you are inside, there’s a fascinatio­n that’s somehow beyond the physical reality of it. You begin to notice the near-impercepti­ble trickles of water seeping through the exposed surface. You observe the texture of sand and sediment, the small pebbles embedded in the chamber’s walls. What you’re glimpsing is a miniature cross-section of the planet that sustains us. It can all get very touchy-feely.

There might be a rock-solid moment of connection with the raw earth where you contemplat­e the planet and nature and all the intricate systems that are in place.

It might be why some folks who have experience­d Earthbox emerge at the other end

claiming they feel “reborn”. It can feel somehow sacred, a hallowed space that brings on deep reflection, turns reality insideout.

‘Going back in time’

Earthbox is, on paper at least, terribly simple. A rectangula­r empty space 24m long by about 7.5m wide, its walls angled outwards as they rise. You don’ttake an elevator to reach it; there aren’t even stairs. Instead, there’s a curved, sloping pathway so that you approach with a full-on view of the Helderberg Mountains in the distance, a low, domelike mound directly in front of you.

And then, quicker than expected, you’re inside, undergroun­d, with no daylight, and a permanent coolness that heightens the slight shock of being somewhere surreal.

“It’s like going back in time,” says Marina Busse, who conceived Earthbox, the inaugural project of Dream Commission, whichBusse started together with fellow dreamer Brad Baard. Their vision is to create completely unique, one-off art-adjacent experience­s that can “help reawaken our sense of childlike wonder that we tend to lose when we become adults”.

With Earthbox, Busse says she and Baard wanted to create an immersive experience that encourages engagement with, and contemplat­ion of, what’s below our feet. “InsideEart­hbox, the earth you’re standing on is 500-million years old,” Busse said. “That’s as old as when Africa and South America were still connected and called Gondwana. That pebble layer on the walls is an ancient riverbed from 2.5-million years ago.”

Creating something so seemingly simple was an engineerin­g feat of note, greatly complicate­d by last year’s high rainfall. “The structure required these clay-like, completely dense Malmesbury residual soils,” says Busse. “It’s these specific soils that allowed us to have raw-earth walls, unmitigate­d, that didn’t require retention of any sort.”

A location scoutsugge­sted Lourensfor­d, a wine farm in Somerset West with a large empty field available to rent. During excavation, water became a huge hurdle. “We’re situated directly between the mountains and the river, which was extremely challengin­g, especially as we were excavating throughout the wettest winter in about 200 years,” Busse says.

The planhad been to do the bulk of the excavation in summer, but the rains started in March, so most of the earthworks happened in winter; and there wasrain every day in June.

To allow for the constant presence of water, Earthbox’s geo-engineers installed an intricate drainage system around the chamber. So, while there are no signs of aqueducts or channels, manholes have been sunk into the ground and sumps and pumps placed down below so that if the groundwate­r rises, it’s immediatel­y pumped out.

The project, which opened to the public in

November, is globally unique; Busse says it’s been created as “a very physical environmen­t” in whichhuman connection with the Earth can be fostered. “It wants to slow you down,” she says of the effect the spacehas on people, “so that you can connect with what is viscerally, physiologi­cally happening in your body.”

That connection can be experience­d with or without one of the audio guides available. There is a soothing 25-minute guided meditation thatmakes you feel invigorate­d and refreshed. Another, designed for anyone keen on the science and history, talks you through the geology. There’s also a guide for children.

Busse says the blank-canvas experience of the chamber can be daunting and “difficult to grasp” in this age of perpetual stimulatio­n; the audio guides are a way of making sense of that perceived nothingnes­s. A good idea is to first visit with an audio guide and then re-enter the chamber without it.

You can also visit for one of the early-morning yoga classes that are held before Earthbox opens to the public. The air is cool and crisp, the instructor’s voice like crystal, and there’s something strangely hallowed about the enfolding space, a weirdly wonderful connection with nature.

Occasional one-off events are scheduled. In May, for example, Zolani Mahola, who for years fronted Freshlygro­und, performed there undergroun­d to a small, rapturous audience. As did cellist S’celo-Chris Njapha and pianist Peter Lewis.

Also hugely popular is the monthly Earthbox Chef Series, when a notable culinary master prepares a multicours­e meal with paired wines; they’re outrageous­ly expensive but unlikely to be the sort of feast you’ll soon forget. And on June 1 there’s a clay workshop, a kind of hands-on therapy session to discover the soothing, meditative joy of using what comes out of the Earth to create something meaningful.

Whatever occasion takes you there, the idea is that just about anything canhappen undergroun­d.Busse says:

“There’s no agenda, no narrative about it. It’sjust a very neutral, agnostic space that can be whatever you need it to be. Some people go inside and have profound moments and are moved to tears. Some can’t wait to get back to their screens.”

Whatever it is, though, it won’t be around forever. The initial plan was for Earthbox to close and be fully deconstruc­ted at the end of April, but its closure has been suspended due to demand. Once it is ready for retirement, the rectangula­r space will be filled in and sealed and the patch in the Lourensfor­d field will be made to look precisely as it was before excavation began over a year ago. No trace of its existence will remain.

Earthbox visits are priced from R120

a person. Visit earthbox.co.za for