Terra Cognita

The 19th and possibly final edition of the Noorderlicht International Photo Festival transcends photographic genres to sketch a picture of the relation between man and nature, on the basis of the work of more than 100 photographers. For the first time Noorderlicht is moving to an exhibition site outside the city for the festival: the main l ocation is the Museum Belvédère on the Oranjewoud Estate, near Heerenveen. The result is nothing less than a declaration of love: a challenging, visually breathtaking exhibition that stimulates the mind and moves the heart at the same time.

It has been said that real nature no longer exists, certainly not in the developed, Western world. But although modern man has cultivated and paved over nature to his own taste, he continues to yearn for the peace, open space and freedom that nature promises. That is more than mere romanticism. Nature, whether it is in a small garden or a vast forest, has a demonstrably positive effect on our wellbeing: patients recover faster there, and stress diminishes. Moreover, contact with nature stimulates the right brain, the seat of creativity. Nature inspires.

Terra Cognita is about the experience of nature, in all its manifestations, from tactile, living and breathing nature, to the nature of our thoughts, its dreamed and fantastic incarnations. Although man sometimes seems to be hardly present in the photos, he has unmistakably left his stamp on it.

In all this work the landscape reveals the emotions and thoughts that the photographer has projected on it. The diverse and complex ways in which we see and experience landscapes – the nature in our genes and our minds – echo through the breadth of Terra Cognita. From timeless black and white to conceptual or computer generated, the blending of genres is total. Like nature itself, this is an exhibition not just to be seen, but to be experienced.

Main exhibition
Terra Cognita is a photographic journey in six chapters, with work which spans a range including landscape photography, documentary photography, art photography and computer generated images.

Location Museum Belvédère | Oranje Nassaulaan 12, Heerenveen
Museum Belvédère, the museum for modern and contemporary art in Friesland, shows four of the six chapters of Terra Cognita. The exhibition begins outdoors, in front of the museum, in a thick woods, visualizing a place where the visitor can get lost, where something unexpected appears around every corner: The Enchanted Forest. The chapter Safe Haven follows indoors, telling the story of nature as a safe place for man.

Passing through the manipulated work in the chapter Inspiration – from mountains that literally follow the fluctuations of the stock markets to work that reaches back to the language of art history – the exhibition ends outside again with the chapter Into the Unknown: a journey into invisible worlds, from the microscopic to the cosmic, in which nature proves to be manipulable right down to the last pixel.

Museum Belvédère stands in the Oranjewoud Estate Museum Park, with splendid gardens and water features and a rich cultural history. The Dutch National Forestry Service has made the park available, so that a large part of the exhibition can be integrated into these beautiful outdoor spaces.

Museum Dr8888 | Museumplein 2, Drachten
The chapter Urban Jungle, dealing with the ways we collect nature around us in parks and other open, public spaces, gardens and even our living rooms, is to be seen in the art and cultural-historical Museum Dr8888. We still hear the call of nature, even after our migration to the safety and prosperity of the city.

Museum Willem van Haren | Minckelersstraat 11, Heerenveen
The multi-faceted Willem van Haren Museum is showing the chapter Untamed. Here another side of nature is to be seen. The unimaginable forces that unleash, and are unleashed by natural disasters remind us of our insignificance. Here we see how vulnera

Ancillary exhibitions
Blokhuispoort | Blokhuisplein 40, Leeuwarden
In the Blokhuispoort in Leeuwarden, a former penitentiary, guest curators give their views on the theme of Terra Cognita.

Satellite programme and church route
Galleries, museums and other venues all across Friesland are also organizing their own photo exhibitions. There is a church route, laid out in cooperation with the Alde Fryske Tsjerken Foundation, with photo exhibitions in beautiful, historic Frisian churches.

Photographers | Terra Cognita
Around 100 photographers from The Netherlands and other countries are contributing to Terra Cognita. In addition to rising young photographers there is also work by established names. A selection:

Yasser Aggour | Jane Fulton Alt | Myrto Apostolidou | Korrie Besems | Sasha Bezzubov | Justine Blau | Kim Boske | Juan Calle | Patricia van de Camp | Alison Carey | Jon Cazenave | Margherita Cesaretti | Christopher Colville | Anita Cruz-Eberhard | Ellie Davies | Dornith Doherty | Bela Doka | Claire Dorn | Rena Effendi | David Farrell | Michael Flomen | Doug Fogelson | Stuart Franklin | Julia Fullerton-Batten | Peter Funch | David Galjaard | Henrik Isaksson Garnell | Andrej Glusgold | Toni Hafkenscheid | Paul den Hollander | Scarlett Hooft Graafland | Britta Isenrath | Gábor Kerekes | Sana Khan | Kalpesh Lathigra | Peeter Laurits | Aislinn Leggett | Sergey Lutsenko | Paula McCartney | Simon Menner | Michael Najjar | Catherine Nelson | Loan Nguyen | Meike Nixdorf | Kasumi Omori | Polixeni Papapetrou | Vandy Rattana | Lola Reboud | Zhao Renhui | Misha de Ridder | Simon Roberts | Susannah Sayler & Edward Morris | Gregor Schuster | Takeshi Shikama | Peter Solne ss | TAXI (Suman Samajpati & Sourav Roy Chowdhury) | Agnes Thor | Goos van der Veen | Tessa Verder | Marco Vernaschi | Benoit Vollmer | Robert Walker

About Noorderlicht
Since 1990 Noorderlicht has organized the International Photofestival, now among the absolute top photography festivals in the world. But Noorderlicht does more. Through its Photogallery, publications, masterclasses, discussions and lectures, and awarding photography commissions, Noorderlicht stimulates the development of photography (particularly in the documentary genre). With its roots in the North of The Netherlands, Noorderlicht directs its gaze out over the world, with an eye for engaged social themes and visual beauty.