Drawing in the Nature Lab

The graphic preoccupation with nature teaches seeing in the sense of conscious perception. Through eye and hand, drawing helps to gain an embodied understanding of the form. In the play with translation and abstraction, we will develop our artistic perspectives.

The workshop is intended to provide intensive access to the study of the plant world. Historical templates from the Berlin University of the Arts teaching archives, as well as models and plant samples from the Botanical Museum, will serve us as a starting point. In the Botanical Garden, we will collect field experiences and rediscover the isolated plant part in its context. Then we will research the collected samples at the Humboldt University's Microscopy Centre and explore structures and growth principles in the microcosm. The participants of the workshop should transfer this comprehensive inventory into further artistic investigations and realize their graphical interpretation of the plant world.

SCHEDULE
 

Day 1

• UdK University Archive
• Drawing historical templates, models, and plant samples

Day 2

• Botanical Garden
• Field research

Day 3

• Microscopy centre of the Humboldt University
• Campus Nord, Charité
• Investigation of plant sample material 

Day 4

• UdK Laboratory for Drawing
• Free working and individual consultations

Day 5

• UdK Laboratory for Drawing
• Free working and a concluding presentation

Kerstin Hille studied communication design at the Kunsthochschule Berlin Weissensee and the Facultad de Bellas Artes Salamanca (Spain). Since 2001 she has worked as a freelance draughtswoman, illustrator and graphic designer in Berlin. Amongst others she did scientific illustrations for the Natural History Museum in Berlin. A further focus of her work lies in the field of printmaking. After a five-year teaching position in drawing at the Graphic Design School in Anklam/Greifswald, she has been head of the Laboratory for Drawing at the Berlin University of the Arts since 2013.

www.kerstinhille.de

Oliver Thie draws to make the visible recognizable. In 2012, he graduated from Kunsthochschule Berlin Weissensee. Since then he has been researching the relevance of hand drawing as a tool of knowledge in cooperation projects with scientists. In 2018 he conserved the shadows of minerals in the Temporary Object Laboratory at Tieranatomisches Theater Berlin. In 2016 he accompanied a biological expedition through the USA to study the social behaviour of aphids. From 2014 to 2016 he was artist in residence at the Natural History Museum Berlin. In a public drawing laboratory he researched microstructures on the Hawaiian cave planthopper (an insect). His works have already been exhibited in the Berlin galleries Stella A and Galerie Parterre as well as in the Kunstverein Neukölln.

www.oliverthie.de