Among the Trees
1 AUGUST – 31 OCTOBER 2020
Hayward Gallery
Enter a forest of art, formed through sculptures and installations, drawings, paintings and photographs.
This group exhibition explores our complex relationship with trees and forests, and their role in our lives and imaginations. 37 international artists draw our attention to these awe-inspiring life forms.
Robert Adams, Eija-Liisa Ahtila, Yto Barrada, Johanna Calle, Gillian Carnegie, Tacita Dean, Peter Doig, Jimmie Durham, Kirsten Everberg, Simryn Gill, Rodney Graham, Shi Guowei, Hugh Hayden, Eva Jospin, Kazuo Kadonaga, William Kentridge, Toba Khedoori, Luisa Lambri, Myoung Ho Lee, Zoe Leonard, Robert Longo, Sally Mann, Steve McQueen, Jean-Luc Mylayne, Mariele Neudecker, Virginia Overton, Roxy Paine, Giuseppe Penone, Abel Rodríguez, Ugo Rondinone, George Shaw, Robert Smithson, Jennifer Steinkamp, Thomas Struth, Rachel Sussman, Pascale Marthine Tayou, Jeff Wall.
The exhibition is kindly supported by the Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia and WarnerMedia.
About the exhibition
In meditative works across different media, they explore how trees – with lifespans much longer than our own – challenge how we think about time, and consider how intimately entangled they are with human affairs.
They invite us to appreciate their soaring scale, in art works such as a monumental sculpture cast from a 2,000-year-old olive tree by Ugo Rondinone, a cinematic portrait of a 30-metre-high spruce tree by Eija-Liisa Ahtila, and a vast forest of trees constructed entirely from cardboard by Eva Jospin.
'beautiful, stirring forest of art at the Hayward Gallery'
Among the Trees transports us around the world – from Colombian rainforests and remote Japanese islands to olive orchards in Israel and a 9,550-year-old spruce in Sweden.
At a time when the destruction of the world’s forests is accelerating at a record pace, see the natural world through new eyes, on a walk through the woods, real and imagined.
Watch the video
'This smart, urgent show of contemporary art is full of startling and moving things, including a 4,000-year-old yew still standing in a British churchyard, and a baobab forest growing underground in South Africa. Visiting it is a humbling experience.'