The exhibition shows works by 14 artists and artist collectives from five centuries. The presentation includes some of art history’s most acclaimed biological illustrators from the 17th to the 20th century and contemporary artists who delve deep into the classical heritage. Together, they illuminate our changing understanding of the forces that shape the natural world and our understanding of man’s place in it.
The exhibition is based on Systema naturae, Carl von Linné’s influential book about the complex interaction between flora and fauna on our planet. This classification system inspired some of art history’s foremost illustrators, who, by depicting the diversity of the flora and fauna, worked at the intersection of art and science. The exhibition thus explores the tradition of biological illustrations – an art form that was developed using watercolor techniques before the advent of photography. Watercolor was the most common method, as it was easy for artists to carry everything needed to make nature studies. One of the aims of the exhibition is to draw attention to the philosophical dimension of the biological illustrations, apart from the purely aesthetic value that the watercolors naturally have.
The exhibition’s historical works are presented in dialogue with modern art that profoundly portrays the great challenges of our time. The contemporary artists in the exhibition reflect a profound change of perspective in various philosophically provocative and conceptual ways. Some of them have extinction and extinction as a theme, but instead of reducing everything to visions of hell, they give expression in their works to more personal reflections on several options for holistic thinking. Some present more lyrical responses to the legacy of Linnaeus, while others hold up a mirror to our tendency to run away from the realization that the cause of our problems is our everyday human addictions.
