Invitation to a press conference for the exhibition “Children’s Biennale – Embracing Nature”

Kinderbiennale

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After getting off to a flying start in 2018, the Children’s Biennale is now entering its second round. This year’s event, based on the theme of “Embracing Nature”, is dedicated to sustainability and the relationship between people and their environment.

The world where we live is calling out ever more urgently for attention, sustainable living and the careful use of natural resources. Extinctions, global warming, a lack of raw materials: climate change is taking on increasingly threatening dimensions and we need to find solutions. Our children will feel the effects the most strongly. At the same time, they also have the potential to ward off the effects.

The Children’s Biennale uses works by contemporary artists to probe into the relationship between humanity and nature. Following the concept developed as long ago as 1713 by Saxony’s chief mining officer Hans Carl von Carlowitz, who came up with the principle of “sustainability” in the face of a looming dearth of raw materials, the focus is on plants and how human beings affect their environment. Different approaches to solving the problem will show how nature has a place in museums, how resources can be used sparingly and how recycling loops can be closed.

The participatory and interactive works of art are aimed at children and anyone else interested in learning how every living being can be secured a long future, and what that future might look like.

The participating artists include: Thijs Biersteker, David Claerbout, István Csákány, The Constitute, Design i/o, Ólafur Elíasson, Mark Justiniani, Giuseppe Licari, Theresa Rothe, Andreas Schlegel, Hazel Lim-Schlegel and Hanna Xin Schlegel. They will be creating large-scale installations in the Japanisches Palais addressing the relationship between humanity and nature.

Thijs Biersteker, for example, dedicates his work “Wither” to the topic of the deforestation of the Amazon rainforest. The Dutch artist depicts the increasing destruction of natural habitats by means of large plant leaves made of recycled plastic which appear to wither away before the viewers’ very eyes, becoming transparent at the same pace as the deforestation actually taking place in the rainforest. In his multimedia-based shadow-theatre tableau “The Dream of the Hammer”, the Hungarian artist István Csákány explores different layers of construction and deconstruction, of the natural landscape, and of work and related symbolism. Giuseppe Licari’s installation “Naked Landscape”, created especially for the Children’s Biennale, demonstrates how nature can even grow inside a museum. During the exhibition, plants will be growing and blooming in a barren landscape of clay at the Japanisches Palais.

When selecting the works of art and putting together the programme, the SKD sought advice from primary-age advisors from a total of three Dresden schools. The museums association is also launching the “Action for Future” project jointly with the “Fridays for Future” movement, turning the Japanisches Palais into a testing ground for the development of a “sustainable culture of sustainability”. The movement will moreover be acting as an advisory body vetting the development of sustainable guidelines for the museum.

The Biennale is a joint initiative by Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden and the National Gallery Singapore. It will be taking place from 18 September 2021 to 27 February 2022 in the Japanisches Palais.

On Saturday, September 18, the SKD invite to a festival in the Japanische Palais from 11 am to 6 pm. The Saxon Minister of State for Culture and Tourism Barbara Klepsch, the Director-General of the Staatlichen Kunstsammlugen Dresden Marion Ackermann and the curator of the Children's Biennial Florence Thurmes will be present at the opening.

To the exhibition