Curated by Dr. Sabine Fellner, Vienna

In its current IPCC synthesis report, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warns of an escalation of the climate crisis, of a: "only temporary overshoot of the 1.5 degree limit - the so-called "overshoot". This may be a "point of no return" after which the world will be a different place. Irreversible damage and impacts loom. Humans have been heating up the planet since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, and industrialized nations have caused 50 percent of the greenhouse gases responsible for current trends. However, the nations of the "Global South" are much more severely affected by the consequences such as drought, heat waves and floods. The continued, unhindered exploitation and economization of resources and the extensive human intervention in biological, geological and atmospheric processes of the earth have led not only to a progressive loss of untouched nature as an emotional resource, but also to the destruction of habitats, massive species extinction as well as to humanitarian, political and economic crises. For a long time, artists have been dealing with the interrelation between man and his environment in their works and visualize the fundamental and irrevocable changes of our planet, the frightening consequences of the Anthropocene.

Numerous exhibitions are currently responding internationally to this urgent problem of the present and make it clear that the environmental theme has arrived in contemporary art. The multimedia exhibition TOUCH NATURE, which will be shown at the Austrian Cultural Forum Berlin to kick off the IMAGINE DIGNITY initiative, is part of a series of exhibitions at eleven Austrian cultural forums in Europe and the USA. It poses the question of the strategies that art develops in the face of increasing destruction, but also as a result of the increasing threat that nature poses to humans.

Works by Austrian and German artists* from the last 10 years enter into a dialogue with each other, casting a critical eye on the profound changes in our earth system and illuminating the ecological crisis from different perspectives. Painting, graphics, photography, sculpture, video and installation are the media they use to formulate resistance against the global exploitation of man and nature. But they also serve to create hopeful visions of a new relationship between humans and nature. Documenting, formulating protest, and developing utopias are the fundamental methods of this artistic exploration.

Astrid Lowack, Dark Water, 2017, Print on Diasec, 100 x 100 cm

Together with Heinz Mack, Otto Piene founded the ZERO group and created elemental works with smoke, fire and light. He is considered a pioneer of his time. Already at the end of the 1950s, the first smoke drawings on paper were created by using candles as a design medium. From this idea, Piene developed the first of his famous fire pictures in the 1960s, combining smoke, fire, light and color to create significant works. In the comprehensive, retrospective exhibition "Otto Piene - Homage to Fire and Light," the Samuelis Baumgarte Gallery is dedicated to his diverse body of work with canvases, gouaches, sculptures, and ceramics. On display are more than fifty outstanding works by the pioneering artist.

The Samuelis Baumgarte Gallery, Bielefeld, presents from 09 February to 06 April 2023 a dialogue between the Austrian modern classic Alfons Walde (1891-1958) and eight contemporary artists. The multi-faceted show of works thereby encompasses a wide range of styles and artistic approaches, each of which, however, deals with the mountain world at the core of your confrontations. In this century-spanning preoccupation with nature, compiled with great care by curator Dr. Sabine Fellner, Vienna, the mountain idyll is critically scrutinized.

The exhibition Alfons Walde in Dialogue juxtaposes for the first time in this diversity Alfons Walde's mountain landscapes, which were created about three generations ago, with artistic positions that currently deal with the mountain world. In view of the fundamental and irrevocable changes in our landscapes and the frightening consequences of the Anthropocene, the age in which man has become the determining factor of influence, a critical dialogue emerges that makes clear what we have already lost and what needs to be preserved and regained. In this sense, the presented positions are united by the vision of artistically reformulating an immediate, respectful relationship of man to nature.