Natascha Sadr Haghighian. passing one loop into another

About

In 2020 Sadr Haghighian was honored by the State of Berlin with the Hannah Höch Advancement Award for outstanding artistic achievements by mid-career artists. On the occasion of her award, the artist is presenting a series of works in the Showroom of Neuer Berliner Kunstverein (n.b.k.) in which diverse thematic strands are interwoven in the figure of an animal. The central installation, passing one loop into another (2017) focuses on the Asian tiger mosquito. Originating in the subtropical regions of Southeast Asia, the insect was discovered to be a carrier of pathogens and diseases such as the Zika virus. The tiger mosquito was first sighted in Italy in the early 1990s, a time marked by increasing global warming as well as the ratification of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) on the deregulation of world trade. To protect themselves from the mosquito, the Italians developed a novel alliance with the native Pippistrellus, a microbat that feeds on insects. The installation shows a larger-than-life model of the tiger mosquito enthroned above a pallet loaded with industrial yarn reels. The yarn comes from the town of Prato, northwest of Florence, a center of the globalized textile industry. Above the insect, resound echolocation hunting calls by the nocturnal pipistrelli, lowered to frequencies audible to humans.