The work of Vangjush Vellahu documents the development of the city of Guangzhou, where he went on a scholarship. The photographs of the neighborhood that is on the verge of destruction by the urgent expansion of skyscrapers and the video interviews with 2 local artists explain the transformation of the city throughout the years and illustrate the transition from the ground to the sky. We are surrounding ourselves with concrete and glass, building vertically so that in the end, in 50 square meters, we can put together 500 people in luxury conditions. The abandoned rooms surrounded by walls that separate the unoccupied, soon to be destroyed area, a glass symbol of capitalist wealth, are the leftovers of a passé civilization, no longer suitable for the high speed increment of technology. In his passing by, Vangjush immortalized a moment in time looking from the point of view of a stranger.
Marina Oprea`s photo installation investigates the appropriation of nature in the concrete prison that the neighbors share. She questions the parentage of these pop up plants. Who brings them in, who do they belong to, who takes care of them? Do they just randomly appear and populate the stairs of the buildings? What is their purpose? Is it an aesthetic one or a way of bringing greenness and freshness into a cagey, enclosed space? The photographs follow the line of the staircase in the gallery so, as you descend, they remain on view, with some randomly arranged and put upside down, but the viewer hardly notices it in the luxuriant scenic installation.
Irina Maria Iliescu`s animation pictures a John Doe sitting in an claustrophobic room just watching nature bloom on television, the only reality that exists confined in the city`s bigger glasshouse. A very concise view on the relation that the urban environment develops with the help of an unreal habitat encapsulated in the little case that is the TV. Watching National Geographic’s documentaries is the only connection to a world altered by adjacency/proximity with the human kind. Peacefully recording on camera the course of nature for all the far away viewers who are anxious and eager to see animals breeding, eating, flowers growing, etc. The constant reminder of that distant environment that does not disturbs us while we go jogging in our own reservations, the city parks.
Following the enclosed environment of the room, Roberta Curcă`s work “Don’t you increasingly miss the surrounding countryside?” maps her own room in a Plexiglas mock-up and we can see this little doll house for what it is, just a scale imitation of the bigger box that it is a typical apartment. The small replica places the viewer in an observer/gamer position. The only thing that’s missing is the human scaled puppet to play with.
Highlighting the changes of our own perception of nature, Kiki Mihuta and Bogdan Olaru recreate through their poetic installation an immaterial landscape. “As we were running away […]” is pointing towards consciousness and quilt, towards our egocentric and destructive nature. Fragmented and barely visible, the question “Will I ever find peace?” is projected between flickering waves.
These are some of the works presented in the exhibition exploring the artist`s relation with nature.
