Contemporary Design

Our unknown acquaintance – The Baltic Sea Forest

by Merika Oksanen
A miniature forest made of algae and placed in a terrarium kind of environment
An abundance of algae washed up on the shore

Does familiarity make us understand better? Can a change of perspective affect a person's ability to see things from a new perspective? How can the Baltic Sea be made more meaningful to people?

Scale models make it easy for people to understand the bigger picture and to compare the unfamiliar with the familiar. What do they have in common? Can we change people's learned attitudes by changing the way we present the sea from mysterious to familiar?

I placed pieces of Baltic Forest washed up on the shore in an aquarium to resemble a scale model of a human forest, or a park, a familiar environment. They are similar.

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