Botanical trajectories and symbolic dimensions of Merano's palm trees (artist's book).
A peculiar phenomenon of the Northern Italian city Merano is its large population of palm trees, which were first planted around 1880 as the city was transforming into a health resort and a tourist destination. With her artists' book, Nanna Debois Buhl seeks to trace the palm trees' botanical trajectories and symbolic dimensions. The publication presents Buhl's research through a collection of materials including conversations with the Merano-based botanist Otto Huber, the design scholar specialized in wallpapers Joanna Banham, and the architect Susanne Stacher specialized in alpine architecture, as well as photos and photograms by the artist, old postcards and touristic posters of Merano, historical and scientific images of palm trees.
Published on the occasion of the exhibition “Art & Nature 2016 – Walking With Senses,” Merano Spring Festival, Italy, from March 24 to June 5, 2016.
Nanna Debois Buhl (born 1975 in Aarhus, Denmark, lives and works in Copenhagen and New York) is a visual artist whose practice is a continuous investigation of historical and cultural knowledge through botany, animal life, imagery, and architectural components. She participated in The Whitney Museum's Independent Study Program, New York (2008-09), and received her MFA from The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts (2006). Her installations and films have been exhibited widely, recently at Pérez Art Museum, FL; SculptureCenter, NY; Art in General, NY; The Studio Museum, Harlem, NY; El Museo del Barrio, NY; Lunds Konsthall, Sweden; Kunsthal Charlottenborg; Kunsthallen Brandts; Museum for Contemporary Art, Roskilde; and Herning Museum of Contemporary Art, Denmark.
