Controlled Burn
Mirjana Vrbaški
For her 2024 photography fellowship from Haus am Kleistpark, Serbian artist and photographer Mirjana Vrbaški (*1978) explored the Trinity Cemetery III in Mariendorf Nord as a fragile urban oasis and diverse biotope threatened by planned development. In her current exhibition “Controlled Burn,” she continues this exploration in light of the global increase in wildfires, drawing on indigenous ecological knowledge and traditional fire management practices that view fire as an ally.
Vrbaški transfers photographs of natural habitats onto wooden panels and then exposes them to flames. Together with other works on glass, this creates spaces for reflection in which fire can be experienced as both a destructive and transformative force, and where processes of destruction and re-creation intertwine.