In the 21st century, wilderness is more mythical than real, with very few blank spots left on world maps that have not been disturbed by human civilization.
In response, Schirn Kunsthalle in Frankfurt has dedicated an entire exhibition to the increasingly obsolete notion of "Wilderness," with a display of works spanning more than a century that include paintings, photography and computer simulations.
Read more: 2018 wildlife photography winners highlight nature's beauty
Seemingly natural
Much of the artwork on show originates at the peak of industrialization when there was an increased longing for untouched wilderness. According to Schirn Kunsthalle director Philipp Demandt, pristine nature has long been held up in contrast to humankind's "overly controlled" world.
Experts say more than 70 percent of the world's last untouched wilderness lies in just five countries
Yet the term wilderness has also long had held negative connotations. According the Demandt, it has long been associated with "darkness and danger," for example, with artists often portraying towering mountains, precipitous rock formations, dark forests and waterfalls, even into the Romance period in the late 19th century when the beauty of and mankind's longing for nature had become the focus.
The museum's curator Esther Schlicht travelled to the US, Africa and across Europe to find the 34 works of widely varying artists now presented at Schirn Kunsthalle. The works span a period of more than 100 years.
Read more: King of the Animals: the Willhem Kuhnert retrospective
International perspectives
Contemporary artists often take a different point of view to impressionistic landscape painters of the past, for instance, with an approach much more critical of civilization, sometimes taking a clear political stand.
Pieter Hugo's Abu Kikan with Fraya, Nigeria (2007) typifies an increasingly disillusioned artistic view of nature
Many artists deliberately left their studios to paint in the wild, others were inspired during their travels by nature left untouched.
The unique thematic exhibition presents works of art from 1900 to the present, with the 30 artists on show inlcuding Tacita Dean, Mark Dion, Jean Dubuffet, Max Ernst, Asger Jorn, Georgia O’Keeffe, Gerhard Richter, Frank Stella, Thomas Struth, Henri Rousseau und Carleton E. Watkins.
Click on the picture gallery for a selection of works by some of these revered international artists.
"Wilderness" runs November 2 through February 3, 2019.
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Europe's most inspiring national parks
Triglav: Orchids and Edelweiss
Mount Triglav lends its name to Slovenia's only national park. The origin of the name, which means "three-headed," is disputed. Some attribute it to the mountain's three-peaked appearance from certain angles. Others claim a Slavic deity of the same name has his throne at the summit. If so, he must have a breathtaking view of its forested slopes, and meadows strewn with wildflowers.
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Europe's most inspiring national parks
Bialowieza: Europe's oldest forests
Protected for centuries as a hunting ground for Polish and then Russian monarchs, Bialowieza National Park retains the last of Europe's primeval lowland forest. Once under royal patronage, its native bison were hunted to extinction by the early 20th century. But they have since been reintroduced, and several herds thrive in the ancient woodland.
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Europe's most inspiring national parks
Saxon Switzerland: German romanticism
Saxon Switzerland National Park lies on the German border with the Czech Republic. For creative inspiration, you could follow in the footsteps of German romantic painters who captured the park's sculptural rock formations. The Malerweg - or "Painter's Path" - consists of 112 kilometers (70 miles) of hiking trails that lead through otherworldly sandstone columns, crags and canyons.
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Europe's most inspiring national parks
Etna: The monster beneath the mountain
In Greek mythology, Typhon, father of all monsters, battled with Zeus until the king of the gods trapped him under Mount Etna. The lava that spits and bubbles from Europe's most active volcano might have you believe Typhon is still waiting for his furious revenge. But volcanoes also make for fertile soils, so Etna National Park is home to some of Sicily's lushest, vineyard-scattered landscapes.
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Europe's most inspiring national parks
Plitvice Lakes: Where Winnetou roams
More than a million visitors flock to Croatia's Plitvice National Park each year to see its network of 16 lakes linked by waterfalls, and the travertine limestone they have carved into undulating steps. It also provided a dramatic location for the Winnetou films - Germany's own cowboy movies based on the books of Karl May.
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Europe's most inspiring national parks
Tatra: Where bears stalk the forests
A range of the Western Carpathian Mountains, the Tatra Mountains span national parks in Poland and Slovakia. Brown bear, lynx, wolves, chamois and marmots are among the fauna at home in its dense forests and alpine meadows. Its majestic birds of prey - including the lesser spotted eagle - have perhaps the best view of these soaring peaks and glistening lakes.
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Europe's most inspiring national parks
Loch Lomond and The Trossachs: Epic vistas
Walter Scott penned his poem "Lady of the Lake" in Trossachs. Loch Lomond and The Trossachs National Park provide plenty of inspiration for such an epic. Osprey skim the surface of its countless freshwater lakes in search of salmon, while Iron Age hut circles, standing stones, a Viking graveyard and the remains of crannogs - ancient manmade islands - tell tales of Scotland's distant past.
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Europe's most inspiring national parks
Gran Paradiso: Haven for the Alpine ibex
Gran Paradiso was Italy's first national park, founded in 1920 to protect the Alpine ibex - then on the brink of extinction. Today, visitors have a fair change of spotting the impressively horned goats in the park's elevated meadows. The bearded vulture, reintroduced 100 years after the last of its species was shot in the park in 1912, looks set to become another restoration success story there.
Author: Ruby Russell
