SNBA - Sociedade Nacional de Belas Artes

Rua Barata Salgueiro 36, 1250-044 Lisboa

12 . 09 . 2024 → 12 . 10 . 2024

monday - friday → 12:00 pm – 07:00 pm

saturday → 02:00 pm – 07:00 pm

Artist

Martina Hoogland Ivanow

Our relationship with nature has become political and intertwined with identity politics in many ways, where an interest or commitment to nature can be seen as an ideological stance.

Martina Hoogland Ivanow’s presentation consists of selected fragments from her ongoing work on a feature-length documentary entitled Second Nature, which follows a group of individuals who dream of a communal existence in nature, drawing inspiration from hunters and gatherers. It serves as a contemporary documentation that illuminates our propensity for irrationality and our search for meaning in these challenging times.

What has become evident to Hoogland Ivanow during the film’s production is that the challenge perhaps lies not solely in Western society’s ignorance of nature in terms of practical knowledge or conveniences but rather in individualism and a lack of willingness to collaborate, as well as the unwillingness to give up certain privileges. The work underscores the importance of reflecting on one another and our aspirations, where nature assumes a secondary role. This might be where the difficulty of the overall transition lies. For Hoogland Ivanow, the film serves as a mirror reflecting the paradoxes of human behavior and the disorientation that characterizes our times, conveying these complexities through an interpretation that blends humor, absurdity, and evocative imagery.