Alter Nature: We Can

20 international contemporary artists and designers

21 Kas 2010
13 Mar 2011
  • Z33
  • Zuivelmarkt 33, Hasselt

Alter Nature: We Can shows the work of 20 international contemporary artists and designers. The exhibition focuses on the different ways in which people have displaced, manipulated or designed nature: from small gardens to private islands, from carrots and bonsai trees to acoustic plants and orange pheasants.

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Alter Nature - source

With:
Adrian Woods, Merijn Bolink, Driessens & Verstappen

In Alter Nature: We Can, Z33 looks at the sub-aspect of fauna and flora in nature. Through the works of some twenty international artists we explore how humankind manipulates nature and how the concept of ‘nature’ constantly changes as a result of this.

The works are not about using nature to meet basic needs (such as health, food, protection, etc.). Interesting projects in this context are legion, but grouped together they almost inevitably lead to simplified contradictions. On the one hand, one has projects that look ‘positively’ upon transforming nature: they find out what technology can do or they show solutions. These projects are often criticised because they seem to subscribe seamlessly to the scientific belief in progress. On the other hand, some projects show the negative side; they look at interventions in nature that have gone wrong. These projects are criticesed to bethe autonomous art corner’s wagging finger. They criticise but do not offer any solutions.

Alter Nature: We Can wants to go beyond this simplified pro-contra positioning. The works on display are therefore devoid of strict utilitarianism and the emphasis is on the historic context of intervention, the multiplicity of manipulations and our fluctuating understanding of the concept of nature.

Alter Nature: We Can is part of Alter Nature, an overarching project by Z33, the Hasselt Fashion Museum and CIAP in collaboration with the MAD faculty, the University of Hasselt, the Flemish Institute for Biotechnology (VIB), KULeuven University and bioSCENTer.

Curator:

Karen Verschooren (Z33)

Artists:

Makoto Azuma (JP)
BCL: Shiho Fukuhara (JP) and Georg Tremmel (AT)
David Benqué (UK)
Julien Berthier (FR)
Merijn Bolink (NL)
Center for PostNatural History
Mark Dion (US)
Driessens & Verstappen (NL)
Daisy Ginsberg (UK)
Tue Greenfort (DK)
Natalie Jeremijenko (US)
Eduardo Kac (US)
James King (UK)
Allison Kudla (US)
Reinier Lagendijk (NL)
Antti Laitinen (FIN)
Hans Op de Beeck (B)
Michael Sailstorfer (D)
Maarten Vanden Eynde (B)
Adrian Woods (NL)
Adam Zaretsky (US)