Strained Terrain
Strained Terrain
Charlotte Bastian
Betty Böhm
Edward Burtynsky
Rosalind Lowry
Thomas Wrede
| The exhibition Strained Terrain at B-Part Exhibition is part of the EMOP Berlin (European Month of Photography) and focuses on the artistic exploration of nature and its profound transformation through human influence. The exhibition presents works by five artists who visualize and rethink the consequences of the Anthropocene for landscape and climate in a variety of mostly purely photographic ways. The question is vehemently posed as to (up to) what degree the world exists - and for whom. Berlin-based artist Charlotte Bastian creates new landscapes from photographs of different places and times - collages and three-dimensional spatial images. Without wanting to be documentary, the artist uses two or three photographic scenes and motifs, which actually depict very different places around the world that she has photographed herself - sometimes with drones - to create a visual non-simultaneity and non-locatability aimed at cognitive dissonance. The images evoke uncanny atmospheres in which residual nature, supposed idyll, wasteland and damaged architecture collide in equal measure. Even as prints in 2-D view, then collaged in analog form, Bastian's photo collages have a powerful effect. When Bastian makes these works visible through a stereoscope - an apparatus for reproducing static images that creates a spatial impression of depth that does not correspond to the physical facts - the method of collage achieves an even more threatening immediacy, the images become almost immersive through the apparatus. Bastian also achieves illusions of immediate depth through her work in lenticular printing technique, which is also shown in the exhibition: a landscape submerged in water with architectural remains that simultaneously appear barely habitable above and below the water level. The artist Rosalind Lowry, who lives in Northern Ireland, is interested in the commercialization of land, the cultural heritage and associated folklore of a landscape that is now disappearing.She is interested in ecological destruction and the resulting social conflicts in Ireland, such as the history and consequences of the Common Land Laws.In her works, situated between land art and landscape photography, Lowry creates a new kind of imaginary environment to show the disappearance of species and landscapes in Ireland as well as the effects of the commercialization of the country.Specific to place and time, the artist uses the power of (documented) intervention to respond to these contemporary issues both poetically and poignantly. Thomas Wrede, who lives in Münster and teaches in Essen, has been working in the Alps for several years on the photo project “White was the snow”.The Rhone and Presena glaciers in Switzerland form the starting point for his photographic works shown in Strained Terrain.He is concerned with the question of how the climate crisis is reflected in the high mountains - in the covered glacier as well as in the discoloration of the melting ice and snow. Wrede documents large-scale, found “stagings” in which partly weathered layers of cloths, foils and fleece sheets are now used to at least slow down the melting process - on behalf of the tourism industry. At the same time, he focuses on the different color nuances of the now contaminated snow and ice. In this way, the traces of the climate crisis can be seen in the color and materiality. At the same time, man's (helpless) interventions make the vulnerability of nature all the more visible. This tension between beauty and transience characterizes Wrede's work and finds expression in his photographs. Nature transformed by industry is a predominant theme in the work of Edward Burtynsky. A few years ago, the Canadian photographer began to develop a contemporary view of the great ages of mankind: the ages of stone, minerals, oil, transportation and silicon.In order to make the associated concepts visible, Burtynsky looked for motifs that are as detailed and true to scale as they are open in their meaning, such as recycling yards, spoil heaps, quarries and refineries.It is places like these that elude our daily experience, but in whose creation and appearance we play no small part through our consumer behavior.This also applies to the places depicted in the two photographs selected for Strained Terrain: a dry farming landscape in Spain (from the “Water” cycle of works) and an iron mine in South Africa (from the “African Studies” cycle of works). According to Burtynsky, his paintings are “intended as metaphors for the dilemma of our modern existence; they seek a dialog between attraction and repulsion, seduction and fear. We are driven by the desire for a good life, and yet we know - consciously or unconsciously - that the world suffers from our success. Our dependence on nature, which provides us with the materials for our consumption, and our concern for the well-being of our planet put us in an uncomfortable contradiction.”In this sense, Burtynsky's pictures can be read as a reflection of our times, and not only for him. Berlin-based artist Betty Böhm's projects focus on the impact of the human species on our planet (and beyond). The human urge to expand, the associated ongoing extractivism and mostly violent appropriation leave direct and indirect traces: wounded landscapes, altered places and destroyed structures. The artist is particularly interested in the inscriptions of past events that reverberate in these places and shape our collective consciousness. Böhm traces such landscapes in order to portray them in their ambivalence. Using a transdisciplinary approach that combines photography, film/video, installation, sound and performance, Böhm interweaves documentary and research-based elements with subjective and poetic-associative levels. The result is immersive, sensual interior landscapes that immerse the viewer in a multi-layered space of experience. This is also the case in her installation “Grove (resurrection)” shown in Strained Terrain: Here, functional and dysfunctional elements of forest landscapes merge on different pictorial levels to form a mirror of anthropogenic dominance. Dead trees are erected, while others have been recreated using timber and paint. At the same time, hanging and lying photographic prints provide insights into the current state of Alpine forests. The work shows a landscape in transition - increasingly artificial, characterized by human ingenuity, but also by helplessness and the remnants of human domination. The result is a contemporary landscape that is both disturbing and fascinating.
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