Meta.Morf 2022:
Ecophilia

How is ecophilia manifested today? Fighting climate change? Giving legal rights to non-humans? Advocating the devolution of the human species – for the better of the planet?

Or should a true ecophile love and care for a nature transformed with all its strange new habitants? What about saving plastic Christmas trees, protecting artificial landscapes and putting genetically modified organisms in the list of protected species?

The exhibition "Ecophilia" present artists who critically question what it means to be a real ecophile –a true lover of nature– today. And how to become better at it?

In our search to become better ecophiles, we are desperate to upgrade our communication with nature.

What would happen if we traded our comfort with the living conditions of animals? With the help of prosthetics, Thomas Thwaites takes on the seemingly careless life of a goat in his work «Goatman (A holiday from being human)». Roaming together with his newfound four-legged companions, Twaites contemplates stripping away the role of humans in the hierarchy of nature.

In the installation «Birdsong», Leena Saarinen brings together languages of people and birds by visualizing bird whistle tones through spectrograms. This allows the viewer to read bird songs just like we read words.

In Annike Flo’s work «States of Chimera», agar growth medium is contaminated with her own microorganisms to create a living sculpture. This is a manifestation for erotic and queer love for the human body.

Extreme measures can be taken to satisfy our desire for ultimate naturalness. Yang Zhichao merges symbiotically with nature in the performance «Planting Grass» (2000) where a surgeon inserts two pieces of grass into the artist’s shoulder. What does the inevitable and painful bodily rejection of the plant roots tell us about our physical bonds with nature?