We exploit modern technologies so intensively that we’re now surrounded and pervaded by them as if by a second nature. And thanks to new tools, materials and media, we’re incessantly upgrading and enhancing this artificial nature created by and for ourselves. And the source we draw upon most frequently in going about this is our original habitat—first nature, so to speak, the flora and fauna of the Blue Planet. This is what we aim to understand, control and improve.

Winking Leaves

Among the participants in this effort is a new type of artist with very highly developed aesthetic, scientific and social skills. “Like a Second Nature,” an exhibition originally curated for Volkswagen’s Automobil Forum Unter den Linden venue in Berlin, shows how these artists deal with the interplay of these naturally and artificially created environments—for instance, ironic takes on scientific methods, robotic plants, winking leaves and synthetically engineered tornados.

Ars Electronica Center, Foyer, RoboLab