An ode to a street flower
Denise Roth (b. 1989, Germany) is a visual artist, designer and writer based in London. With a background in anthropology and architecture her artistic practice is tinged by cultural and spatial exploration. Her work looks closely at the transformative power of natural habitats and artificial environments. Working across different medias, her process is driven by curiosity and intuitive experimentation as well as intense research, craftmanship and story telling.
With her work she captures moments to contemplate the beauty and complexity of our environment and natural world, moments of force and introspection, often seemingly beyond reality. Concerned with the fragility of our ecosystem and being, she explores these often conflicting realities. To find a togetherness in the post-anthropocene that enrichens both human and nature space, she experiments with tools to shape a sensitivity and kindness towards our environment and moments of beauty.
She studied architecture at Vienna University of Technology and Academy of Fine Arts Vienna and holds a MSc with distinction in architecture from Vienna University of Technology. Her master's thesis "The Being of Things-In search of a dialogue with nature", based on a research trip to Japan and funded by the KUWI grant, was selected for Archdiploma 2021 and also shown at OPUS ASIAE, Museo Henrik Christian Andersen.
Before studying architecture she studied art history and anthropology at the University of Vienna. In the past she has worked as editor, freelance designer and architect.
The short experimentational video accompanied by a poem to encapsulate a moment of exploration and encounter with nature in the dense city.
It traces a moment where, despite the human impact and scarce environment, nature glows with a powerful beauty, letting us dream and expand our space. An exploration, a serenity, an intimacy almost. The video explores a moment of ultimate restorative strength and power and questions the anthropocentric vision. It captures the resilience embodied by our earth. It let's us transcend for a moment into the densest rainforest, reminding us of the strong connection we once had. It enables a moment of interaction, a moment of restoration in-between the reality.
The video emerges from a continuous exploration of nature and its various forms of symbiosis. It engages with the fascination of harsh environments, where nature and the flora and fauna often thrive in the fullest. Here it explores a place where nature seems to thrive with us, almost together in symbiosis, the roots lifting up the concrete. It shows the beauty of what could be in the age after the anthropocene, if the human will once again allow space and true kindness for nature.
The poem and video are embedded in a wider photographic series.