This exhibition by Benedikt Terwiel comprises two pieces that reveal the scars that humans have left on the earth over centuries. Adopting the vision of a negative evolution of the landscape where prosperity, development, and wealth give way to the devastation and disfigurement of the planet, Disfiguration Land is divided between two media.
The Land before Last is a film based on data from the Dutch National Topographic Institute, which forms a model of the country’s land surface. However, in this scenario, all human development and life has been erased, leaving only traces of settlement recognized in the marks carved into the earth. ANOHNI’s voice guides us through this vast archaeological site.
In Muttersteine, the artist starts by digitizing the surface of a stone that documents the area of the Berlin neighborhoods of Spandau and Charlottenburg, from industrialization to the 1930s. Enlargements of this stone reveal landscapes in which the retouching transforms into fragmented, cratered terrain that almost seems to anticipate the destruction during the war.