Ilkka Halso – Naturale. A Text published in The Helsinki School, Vol.5 - From the Past to the Future.
What is happening? Has nature been evacuated to wait for better times, or has it been chopped and simplified into transportable merchandises and items of decorative tableaux?
My work deals with the urban man’s ambivalent relationship to nature. It is typical for human beings to exploit natural reserves and build, mold and order nature into geometrical forms. This is justified by aesthetic and economic aspirations on the one hand. On the other, wild untouched nature is often valued and preferred as worth preserving. Though, in the crossfire of human interests, nature is usually the first one to fall.
In my photographs, consumption of nature has taken a concrete form. Whole ecosystems have been harvested and collected into a gigantic warehouse. Elements of nature are arranged in city-like blocks in strict order. Objects of nature have been rethought and have, for logistical purposes, been packed into modules that are easy to handle and transport.
Different types of nature, from soil and flora to fauna, can easily be collected, transported and assembled into new working ecosystems.
I am looking into the future; I don’t like what I see.