In the Woods

From 2016–18 students of the Art & Science master course have been working on the implications of a contemporary academic discourse that aims at reframing our un­derstanding of ‘Nature’. Artistic imagi­nations concerning Nature become marked­ly influenced by new insights of various scientific disciplines. In order to narrow down this rather broad topic, the rese­arch focused on the question of ‘what is a forest?’ Students were exposed to a mul­tidisciplinary scientific discourse inspi­red by many new theoretical and practical silvicultural insights. These theoreti­cal discussions regarding our relations­hip with Nature were complemented by an experiential and experimental component where students could deepen their under­ standing on forests through practical on-site research. For this purpose, they stayed in the forests of Transcar­pathia (Ukraine) for ten days in July 2017. Together with local stakehol­ders (environmental state authorities, NGOs, (Wood) Industry, socio-cultural actors, etc.), visions and versions of what a forest ‘is’ were debated. In a second phase, the group returned to the Ukrainian forests in September 2018 to assemble its research findings, allies and questions around a plot of land in search for a latent commons. The 48hour happening, ‘The Landing is on Friday’, was an event of ‘speculative ecology’. It took place between trees and ruins and welcomed aliens that had emerged beyond our (knowledge)horizons.

Chair: Bernd Kräftner; in collaboration with: Brishty Alam, Valerie Deifel
Cooperation partners: Verein NESTU (Swiss-Transcarpathian Network), Bogdan Popov (Ecosololutions Forge), Rupert Seidl (Univer­sity of Natural Resources and Life Sciences Vienna)