Touch Nature

Authors’ Comment

Touch Nature Bucharest
The multimedia exhibition Touch Nature in Bucharest is part of a series of exhibitions organized across twelve Austrian Cultural Forums in Europe and the USA. Curated by Alexandru Ion Radu and Sabine Fellner, it raises the issue of seeking the answers art develops in response to the increasing destruction and the growing threat nature poses to humans.
Works by Austrian and Romanian artists enter into dialogue, critically examining the profound changes in our terrestrial system and highlighting the ecological crisis, which they address from different perspectives.
The exhibition approaches reflect two types of critical positions on the human-nature relationship, presented in the two venues of the contemporary art space /SAC.
Berthelot:
A 130 sqm dystopian home, furnished with plain, white furniture from the world's most famous manufacturer. The living space features art and science installations instead of household objects. The tools collect data about the temporary inhabitants (visitors) and integrate their presence into the system. Hybridization occurs and is illustrated in real-time.
Malmaison:
A multi-tiered mini-structure for mixing cotton, acrylic, semiconductors, oil, and chlorophyll. An art flower shop or green gallery with 21 curiosities and a TV, among 192 plants, arranged in sets of 4 per shelf.
White modules measuring 185x90x40, arranged in a polished cement grid, with a mixing system for approximately traditional expression media. Display/exhibition space for leaves and objects assembled from white profiles; a sketch of a profile for a new type of daily reality: the Anthropocene.
A note: do not pull the handle (it’s not interactive), the entrance is through the living room, via the back door.
We explore the overlaps and networks of relationships established between the exhibits and the spaces containing them.
The exhibition system is constructed as an installation that facilitates interaction, interference, and intersections between the stories of each object.