200 Million Years

The project 200 Million Years takes its title from the long evolutionary history of butterflies, which have existed for over 200 million years – long before the 300,000-year history of humanity. This vast timespan stands in contrast to their current fragility, as the sixth mass extinction and the dramatic decline of insect populations threaten entire ecosystems. The butterfly symbolizes our ambivalent relationship with the natural world: we admire its beauty while bearing responsibility for the destruction of its habitats.

200 Million Years consists of several interconnected works and is a multimedia portrait bringing together different perspectives on the butterfly. Through the photo series Landscapes, 200 Million Years, Still Here, Complete World, the film Dreams Worth Remembering, and the poem Entirety, these works open a space in which questions of identity dissolve and sensory experience moves to the foreground. As a direct appeal, the poem Entirety seeks to hold the fear, frustration, and hope that arise in the midst of this unfolding ecological crisis.