Remembering Landscape

What does landscape mean today? Still the romantic ideal of a diversified natural, agricultural and settlement area? Modern landscapes today are often 'non-places'. They bear traces of economic interventions, changing demarcations, are marked by displacement and war as well as by urban sprawl and mining. Quite often, only a kind of residual nature remains, where a few ruins tell of historical events. Barren landscapes that speak of past violence are degraded to (illustrative) material. At the same time, (war) memories are visibly embodied in architectural monuments from the 20th century. In this exhibition and in numerous contributions to the extensive book, 24 artists and artist groups bring the theme of landscape to life. Landscapes between fiction, symbolism and documentation are presented, and they appeal to our ability to read and decipher these images--and, quite naturally, call upon our imagination and our ability to feel empathy. --Publisher.