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Описание изображения

Anna Fobia

Flora Fatalica

Date
2022

About the Item

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The ‘Flora Fatalica’ project concerns the relationship between man and the plant world. What species does man consider useful, and which ones does he try to exterminate? How can we maintain a safe relationship with the environment? The artist answers these questions by addressing the ecological issue of the uncontrolled spread of the Sosnowsky hogweed plant (Heracleum sosnowskyi, Latin).

This invasive species is now widespread in Russia and poses an increasingly accelerated threat. Since the mid-20th century Sosnowsky’s hogweed has been cultivated in the USSR as a silage plant. Subsequently it turned out that the plants easily run wild and penetrate into natural ecosystems, almost completely destroying them. In addition, hogweed can cause significant damage to health: if its juice gets on human skin this causes photosensitivity under ultraviolet light and dangerous burns occur. This plant has been officially recognized as a weed since 2015, and an active fight is being waged against its proliferation.

The artist refers to the historical period of cultivation of the Sosnowsky’s hogweed and wishes to draw attention to its substitutive influence on the flora of cities and suburbs, as well as how modern technologies can be used to prevent its invasion into ecosystems and preserve other species. The object in augmented reality clearly demonstrates the speed of the spread of hogweed. Virtual hogweed can be ‘grown’ in any part of the country. This demonstrates the danger of its ubiquity and at the same time allows us to study it at a ‘safe distance’.

Anton Gladilin, agroecologist and head of the Stopborshchevik movement, took part in preparation of the project.

The object was created with the support of the Rosbank Future Cities digital public art festival.

About the Artist

Anna Fobia (born in Moscow in 1987) is a multimedia artist working with light. She creates conceptual light sculptures and site-specific installations, also working with graphics. The artist explores the properties of light and synthesizes them with philosophy and mythology, on the basis of scientific knowledge, subsequently rendering these studies in a complete semantic form. She graduated from the Animation Lyceum of Cinematography as a qualified animation film artist and majored in art theory at the Faculty of Theory and History of Art, Surikov Moscow State Academic Art Institute.

Other Works

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