Nature Awakens

Wild boars roaming the streets of Haifa, the Barcelona Opera marking its reopening with a concert for 2,000 plants, dolphins (falsely) rumored to have reached the Venetian canals… While the coronavirus pandemic has put the world on a stand-still, nature has continued its course and invaded our urban territories, in both reality and imagination. The expression “nature awakens” reflects a soothing new reality, a heartfelt longing for a better world, and it is also a source of incongruous humorous content that has spread virally on the Web.

The exhibition “Nature Awakens” held at the Edmond de Rothschild Center presents an array of visual representations: from works created before the epidemic’s outbreak that have taken on a new meaning in the light of this past year’s events; to new works prepared especially for the show. The works include a wide range of formats and disciplines (illustration, architecture, textile design, photography, interactive art and more) and showcase 15 young artists who all graduated from art and design schools in Israel in the last five years.

The exhibition sets side by side a sound-controlled imaginary nature; endangered wild plants and animals on an airplane journey; shirts embroidered with jungle and wildlife images as a response to unpaid leaves; and the happy summer memory of a wild and thorny cactus garden in Arad, redesigned to reflect a world turned upside down. Like a reminder of the ground that has collapsed under our feet this past year.