For Avant l’orage (Before the Storm), Danh Vo was asked to provide a new installation for the space of the Rotunda at the Bourse de Commerce. Vo’s Tropeaolum takes root in this greenhouse of metal, concrete, and stone to create a shifting territory where narratives become intertwined. The trunks of oak trees, victims of time and storms, which were selected together with the French National Forest Department, are held up by wooden structures used in construction. Pieces of wood from sustainable forests owned by Craig McNamara belonging to the artist also form part of this installation. McNamara is none other than the son of Robert McNamara, former US Secretary of Defense and architect of the Vietnam War, indirectly responsible for the exile of the artist’s family, who fled the consequences of the war to make a new home for themselves in Denmark. The work is also rooted in the life that Vo has lived since 2017 on his studio and farm in Güldenhof, near Berlin.