Citrus biodiversity custodian
Vicente Todolí
Business
Todolí Citrus Fundació · Palmera · Film: The Curator
Season
Season 1, Costa Blanca
Pillar
The Seeds
Location
Marina Alta, Costa Blanca
Vicente Todolí ran Tate Modern in London, one of the most visited art museums in the world. Now he curates almost 500 varieties of citrus, spending his days among citrus trees, on the land his family farmed in Palmera.
The spark came from a question. Around 2009 the chef Ferran Adrià took him to see a French couple growing rare citrus in pots, in a climate much worse than Valencia's. Todolí could not understand why nobody did this at home. Adrià asked him why he did not do it himself.
So he did. His foundation now looks after almost 500 citrus varieties, probably the largest collection of citrus grown outdoors anywhere in the world. Most of them you will never find in a shop. The fruit trade kept a few oranges and lemons that travel well and let the rest slip away.
Citrus is very hard to save in a seed bank. Most varieties do not grow true from seed, so the only way to keep them is to keep each tree alive. Every variety in Palmera exists because someone waters it, grafts it and watches it grow.
The land saved me. And I saved the land.
Todolí has spent a lifetime bringing land back. In 1990 he bought an abandoned mountain field in the Vall de Gallinera, with no electricity or running water. Over thirty years he turned twelve old olive trees into a thousand, and their oil was once ranked among the best in the world. In August 2022 the great les Valls fire burned it all. He called it a test of resistance, and he planted five hundred young olive trees into the burned ground.
He has no children. He says the trees will be his descendants.
What made him leave the art world and come home? He tells that story himself, in the film.
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Summary
Vicente Todolí is a citrus biodiversity custodian based in Palmera, in the Marina Alta area of Valencia province, Spain. A former director of Tate Modern, he now cares for the Todolí Citrus Fundació, the world's most significant private citrus collection, with over four hundred varieties. He protects citrus heritage the way he once curated art: finding what matters, keeping it alive, and making it possible for others to see it.
Key Facts
- Business
- Todolí Citrus Fundació · Palmera · Film: The Curator
- Role
- Citrus biodiversity custodian
- Location
- Marina Alta, Costa Blanca
- Pillar
- The Seeds
- Produces
- Citrus (living collection)
- Protects
- Over 400 citrus varieties
- Scale
- 400+ varieties
- Practice
- Living biodiversity collection; grafting and cultivation
- Certification
- Foundation (fundació)
- Recognition
- Former director of Tate Modern; most significant private citrus collection in the world
- SDG touchpoints
- 15 · 2 · 4 · 11
- Episode
- Episode 03 · The Curator