After Nature

Mathias Kessler (b. 1968) works in the field of intersection between art and science. He is intensely interested in nature’s own communication and tools for growth and survival – tools that are now being threatened by human interference.

After Nature takes the form of a specially designed greenhouse created for Gl Holtegaard’s baroque garden. Inside, Mathias Kessler has isolated six plants from Danish nature in order to be able to measure and register their communication and general growth. With the aid of electrodes that measure even the weakest impulses, advanced technology and a robot ensure the necessary care of the plants, which will be allowed to grow completely undisturbed until autumn. The artwork functions both as an aesthetic vision and as a scientific experiment, the aim being to map the plants’ communication and natural growth conditions. 

Project by Mathias Kessler and Wendelin Weingartner Ph.D.
with support by George M. Gallant Jr., Inna Loebl and Karl Biewald.
Thanks to Ecodome and Prof. Henrik Balslev, Aarhus University

After Nature is sponsored by Advokatfirmaet Erritzøe, Kunstrådets internationale billedkunstudvalg, Bundesministerium für Unterricht, Kunst und Kultur and the Austrian Embassy to Denmark.