Conversing with Leaves

The artist Uriel Orlow will talk about some of his recent art projects which look to the botanical world as a stage for politics and history: trees as witnesses, the migration of flowers, botanical nationalism, gardens as tools of resistance, and medicinal plants testifying to neo-colonialism – these are some of the themes that Uriel Orlow has been engaging within his research-based art practice. The artist takes specific places and micro-histories as starting points for conversations about human plant entanglements and creates artworks in which plants are both narrators and protagonists.

Uriel Orlow’s artistic practice is research-based, process-oriented and multi-disciplinary including film, photography, drawing and sound. Recent solo exhibitions include La Loge, Brussels; State of Concept, Athens; Kunsthalle Mainz, Tabakalera, San Sebastian; Kunsthalle St Gallen, Les Laboratoires d’Aubervilliers Paris, Market Photo Workshop and Pool, Johannesburg; The Showroom, London or Castello di Rivoli, Turin, among others.

Orlow’s works are presented internationally in museums, film festivals and major biennials, including Manifesta 12, Palermo (2018), Sharjah Biennial (2017) and the Venice Biennial (2011). In 2020 Orlow received the CF Meyer Prize and in 2017 he received a Sharjah Biennial Prize. Orlow has also been awarded three Swiss Art Awards at Art Basel. Recent monographs include “Conversing with Leaves” (Archive Books, 2020), “Soil Affinities” (Shelter Press, 2019) and “Theatrum Botanicum” (Sternberg Press, 2018). Uriel Orlow is a Senior Researcher at University of Westminster London, Visiting Professor at Royal College of Art London and Docent at University of the Arts Zurich (ZHdK).

Photography: Renato Cruz Santos