999 Ways of Shaping Nature: an exhibition by visiting researcher Cristiana Macedo

What does it mean to shape nature, and what does it mean to represent it? Rather than
understanding landscape as a mere reproduction of the natural world, this work
approaches it as a subjective construction, shaped by perception, memory, materiality,
and experience.
Through the collection and use of soils from different geographical contexts, namely
Portugal and Finland, the work explores how landscape can be translated into matter and
transformed through artistic practice. Removed from their original environments, these
materials become fragments of territories, carrying traces of distinct places, climates,
histories, and conditions. Their displacement establishes a dialogue between different
geographies, while raising questions about the relationship between nature, place, and
representation.
The work also investigates the ephemeral character of natural materials and their
continuous transformation when exposed to new environments. Changes in colour,
texture, consistency, and composition reveal the instability of matter and the
impossibility of preserving it in a fixed state. The materials are not simply used to
represent landscape; they actively participate in its transformation, bringing their own
qualities, limitations, and temporalities into the creative process.
Within this context, shaping nature becomes both an act of interpretation and an
encounter with the unpredictable. Each gesture, intervention, and material combination
produces a different possibility of constructing landscape.
Ultimately, the work reflects on landscape as something that exists beyond its physical
boundaries: a relationship between what is observed, what is collected, what is
transformed, and what is imagined. To shape nature is also to be shaped by it, recognising
that every attempt at representation is temporary, situated, and inevitably subject to
change.

999 Ways of Shaping Nature
16–22 November 2026
F Lobby, Väre, Otaniementie 14, Espoo

Cristiana Macedo is a PhD Student in Fine Arts at the Fine Art Faculty of University of Porto and a FCT (Science and Technology Foundation) scholarship holder (2023.04751.BD.). Member of the VICARTE Research Unit - Glass and Ceramics for the Arts at FCT/UNL, Lisbon and i2ads Research Institute in Art, Design and Society, Porto.