The forest line, as if symbolically, seems to indicate some boundary of the forest or a level of the forest that we all are familiar with.
It is marked to delineate a certain territory, and this forest line, unfortunately, due to the impact of climate changes, often diminishes to smaller and smaller areas.
Furthermore, the forest line can also be understood as a graphical notation, that means measuring some data, either temperature changes or humidity, etc.
So, it's like a curve.
Of course, last but not least, the forest line as a chronological story, because this exhibition begins around 10,000 years BC with
a piece by Michal Marcinko and leads us up to the present with questions about what might happen in the future.
It showcases the work of nine visual artists, eight Slovak and one Finnish artist, who met at this exhibition,
which is not only a story about the forest but also talks about exploring our land, its history,
and also about various species that might have disappeared from this land due to climate change issues.
This exhibition features a really wide spectrum of artistic mediums.
There are drawings, and painting has the largest representation, especially by the artist Helen Todd.
Furthermore, there are spatial installations, so Michal Czinege, it's a painting, a spatial installation.
Next is a sculptural object, but also more or less an installation by Martin Piaček.
We also have videos from Michal Machciník, an artist from Košice, who presents a larger project named SUP Fossil Turn Over,
where a video object adjusted on a didactic pad and frottage.
We have a film, actually a documentary fiction by directors Denis Kozerawski and Peter Kašpar named Kambium 1492.
And then there are some minor videos that authors created alongside their work.
The first to be invited to this exhibition was Slovak painter Michal Czinege, who lives in Finland, with whom I had collaborated before.
And since his wife is also an artist, but more focused on audio or a slightly different form, maybe working with video and film, I also approached her.
So, in fact, it was like a joint arrival of a married couple, but with the fact that each does something completely different.
Slovak painter Michal Czinege in this exhibition presents a very large painting installation,
focusing on the theme of plant species extinction, and on these canvases, we can see paintings of plants from the Finland region, where he lives.
These are plants that are originally very small in size, they are several centimeters, but the authors deliberately enlarge them to allow us, people, to enter their world.
This work is not only about painting but also about light, because in some few-second intervals, colored light flashes there.
And that actually causes a feeling that these plants are disappearing before our eyes.
So, it's a nod to how quickly, literally in a moment, plants can disappear and never return, thus, it's about the fragility of being.
Artists were chosen mainly those who focus on either the theme of a forest or nature, or really have an interest in ecological themes.
I managed to gather artists who, in their work, for example, work with the theme of oak wood or simply have some forest connections, let's say.