NATURE AS INFRASTRUCTURE – A PROPOSITION BY THE WINTER OFFICE

Nature As Infrastructure is a month-long programme of talks, films, artworks and projects from THE WINTER OFFICE and invited artists. The programme has been organised as part of an invitation by Adélaïde and Atlantis Lumière , in the frame of Manifesta 13 Les Parallèles du Sud. Originally, we were scheduled to produce an exhibition in Adélaïde’s space this November, but due to the rise of Covid-19 infections and the national lockdown in France, the physical exhibition has now been cancelled and instead it is taking place online. The programme can be accessed online from the 14th of November via: our website and/or through Bruise, www.bruisemagazine.com, a new online magazine of art and artistic ideas produced in partnership with Triangle - Astérides.

Nature as Infrastructure encapsulates the research interests and theoretical underpinnings of The Winter Office, focusing primarily on the relationship between nature, humans and the urban environment. These are at the same time informed by the diverse creative contexts surrounding the initiatives and projects led by the group’s collaboration with SixtyEight Art Institute and Really Simple Syndication Press, both based in Copenhagen.

Through new artistic connections and contexts, the programme examines how we can re-establish a new connection to nature, rethink a renewal of society, and inspire the design of future public spaces by asking how to reintroduce nature into cities. The initiative presents films, ideas, and conversations from a number of artists and thinkers engaging with the various preoccupations of the group, and examines how the concept of 'Nature as infrastructure' is treated through artistic strategies.

The programme includes artworks by Raul Baltazar, Filip Vest, Madeleine Andersson, Ingrid Book & Carina Hedén, Hugo Hopping, Frans Jacobi and Gitte Sætre, the Living Unliving Surveillance Poet, and THE WINTER OFFICE. A poetry performance by David Lau, as well as conversations with Gitte Juul, Anja Franke, Jeanne Betak. Alongside this there are book discussions on No Safe Space by Peter Brandt led by Aurelia Defrance, and Cerro Point Blanco by Lehman Brothers led by Oscar Salguero. Jeanne Betak also presents Anders Abraham's A New Nature, Amara Higuera Hopping gives an immersive reading of her upcoming book the west awaits no one and the programme closes with a lecture by Jeffrey C. Stewart..

The programme concludes with the launch of a new publication, Nature as Infrastructure published by Really Simple Syndication Press. The text introduces a discussion about the importance of generating higher standards of spatial justice through the design of urban forests and at the same time argues for new roles of citizen participation. This includes ideas for how to create social spaces through forest design which can lead to a new engagement with nature and urban space. The discussion is led by Copenhagen-based Architect, Elzélina Van Melle. All these facets considered, the Nature As Infrastructure: A Proposition by The Winter Office programme aims to imagine a new role for Nature, not only as infrastructure, but also as a catalyst to a discussion on the power of creativity to act as a disaster mitigator. Arguing instead for the distributive potential of an emerging consultant framework led by artists, and that any regeneration project demands new ways of imagining and driving architecture, landscape design, art, and ‘communities of practice’ to form around solutions.