In In the Field, artist Milah van Zuilen explores our relationship with the natural environment. Not as something separate from us, but as a system we are part of. Her work emerges from long-term observation, collecting, and organising in the field.
During her walks, Van Zuilen follows self-imposed rules. At times, she focuses on a single plant species in an area and maps its distribution. At other moments, she collects material from all the plants in a specific location to reveal the richness and diversity of the landscape. And sometimes she lets go of her system and works intuitively. The resulting collages are always tied to a specific place.
Her work creates a tension between control and surrender, between human systems and the complexity of nature. What happens when we let go of the need to name and control everything? And what becomes visible when we reconsider our relationship to what surrounds us?
In the exhibition, not only the artworks take center stage, but also the research that precedes them. Through sketches, photographs, notes and videos, Van Zuilen invites visitors into her interdisciplinary practice, where art and ecology come together.
With In the Field, Rijksmuseum Twenthe invites you to look differently: more attentively, more slowly, and with an awareness of what cannot easily be captured.
