Lecture
The project brings together artistic research and field biology through the work of Ben Nurgenc and invited biologists from the international initiative Remote Forests, which focuses on primeval forests in Eastern Europe.
The emphasis lies on field-based methodologies: how primary forests are identified, how they are mapped, and which scientific protocols and tools—both physical and digital—are used in this process. A central focus is the transition from initial field scouting to systematic documentation and long-term monitoring, as well as the ways these practices shape knowledge about forest ecosystems.
Rather than presenting the forest as a static subject, the project addresses the operational structures through which it becomes legible, recorded, and protected. The discussion opens up questions of method: mapping strategies, data collection in situ, and the logistics of sustained environmental monitoring within conservation frameworks.
Ben Nurgenc is a concept-based artist and mycologist. His artistic practice operates at the intersection of art, ecology, and field research. At its center is the artistic contextualization of biotope explorations, walking, and scouting processes as performative practice. Drawing from his work in biotope mapping, he investigates movement, observation, and mapping as autonomous artistic methods. He understands walking and scouting not as research, but as a practice in which perception, movement, and situated knowledge converge. His works emerge through direct contact with landscape. Alongside this, he collects notes, maps, photographs, and found objects, which are incorporated into a growing archive. Presented in exhibitions, the archive makes ecological contexts experientially accessible.
Webpage: bnurgenc.com
Instagram: @ben_nurgenc
Symposium: October 3, 3 pm / Flutgraben – Projektraum
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Photo: Ben Nurgenc © 2025