This catalogue, published on the occasion of the eponymous exhibition at Centre des arts d’Enghien-les-Bains in 2020, offers a fresh take on the fundamental concept of nature, in an age when science and technology are capable of replicating its phenomena. Are we talking Nature 2.0, a reboot resulting in total control or on the contrary liberation of nature? Seen through an artistic lens, does nature retain its original essence, or does it become nothing more than artefact?
Highlighted are two Dutch media artists: Nicky Assmann and Jan Robert Leegte, plus some guest contributions.
Each of the two artists has their own method to deal with these questions. The immaterial and intangible character of light, colour and motion forms the starting point of Nicky Assmann’s spatial installations. With a background in Film and ArtScience, she combines artistic, scientific and cinematographic knowledge in experiments that use physical and chemical processes. By implementing natural and optical phenomena she creates visual music compositions for an immersive and sensorial experience. Assmann experiments in her work with the different components of the cinematic apparatus. She creates her own screens with materials that range from iridescent soap films, heat-stained and chemically treated copper sheets, to metal grids and kinetic transparent plates with moiré patterns. Another motive in her work is what Assmann calls “hypercolours”, brought out by sunlight and occurring both in nature and the digital colour spectrum.
Jan Robert Leegte was one of the first Dutch artists to make work on and for the Internet since the 1990s. In this early fase he started creating formal / material investigations within the browser for example www.scrollbarcomposition.com. He has been with one foot in the 90’s net art movement, with the other in the post-internet movement, implementing digital materials in the context of the physical gallery space.

French art critic and socio-anthropologist Jean-Paul Fourmentraux, Dutch experimental filmmaker and artist Joost Rekveld, Dutch multimedia artist Eric Parren, and Italian art historian and theorist Filippo Lorenzin feed into a discussion about future potential fictions inspired by nature.

Softcover, 21×24,5 cm, published in 2020.
bilingual edition (English / French)
176 pages, full-colour illustrations.