200 Million Years


The project 200 Million Years (2025) takes its title from the deep evolutionary history of butterflies, who have existed for over 200 million years - predating the 300.000 year long existence of humanity by far. This timeline serves as a counterpoint to their fragility today, as the ongoing sixth mass extinction and drastic insect population declines threaten entire ecosystems. The butterfly serves as an ambassador for our ambivalent relationship with the environment, as we admire its beauty while simultaneously bearing responsibility for the destruction of these insects' habitats.

Composed from several interrelated works, 200 Million Years represents a multidimensional portrait, synthesizing different perspectives on the butterfly, to investigate the concept of a universal reality imposed by our human senses. In the photographic series Landscapes, 200 Million Years, Still Here, Complete World, the film Dreams Worth Remembering and the poem Entirety, this body of work opens up a space in which the viewer forgets their identity and floats in the experience of being alive. As a direct appeal the poem Entirety seeks to hold the fear, frustration and hope that are evoked in the midst of this unfolding ecological crisis.