STEFANIE ZOCHE
BACKGROUND
In my artistic work, I have been dealing with ecological issues for around 20 years, in particular the climate crisis, dwindling resources and the relationship between humans and nature. The media I use range from spatial installations and sculptures to video installations and photography.
For more information, including a full biography, see https://www.haubitz-zoche.de/.
STEFANIE’S DO PICHO PROJECTS
In September 2024, Stefanie described her first Do Picho Project as follows: “During my first artist residency in Palas del Rei, I would like to deepen my engagement with the forest ecosystem:
I learned that a large paper mill is to be built in this area of Galicia, which would have a devastating impact on the environment: It would cover an area of 366 hectares, consume as much water as the entire province of Lugo and threaten the biodiversity of the entire region.
I lived in Portugal for some time and saw the ecological destruction caused by paper mills: Intact forests are often cleared to make room for monocultures of eucalyptus plantations. This non-native tree species displaces almost all other plants due to its secretion of essential oils and usually leads to a lowering of the groundwater table as it has very deep roots. This has very serious consequences for the surrounding agricultural areas and can lead to the formation of deserts in the long term.
During my artist residency in Palas, I would like to artistically engage with the existing forests on site, document their rich biodiversity and develop installative works from my observations. I am interested in communicating w i t h the local activists and finding out more background information.
These thoughts form a framework within which I would like to engage with the greatest possible openness about what I find during my research on site”.
Ultimately, Stefanie made video recordings and screened a first version of her video CELULOSA INVASIVA at an event at Do Picho before she returned to Germany (for more information, see Stefanie’s Do Picho Work).
In June 2025, Stefanie came back to Do Picho for a second residency, to focus on two separate, but linked projects, which she describes as follows:
“First, I want to prepare screenings of the video CELULOSA INVASIVA in public spaces in Galicia in the spring of 2025.
I am going to convert a car trailer into a mobile sculpture featuring a fold-out projection screen. This ‘videomobile’ will enable me to show CELULOSA INVASIVA in public spaces across Galicia. I would like to collaborate with environmental organisations, activists and individuals to organise events to accompany the presentations in different cities.
These events will also address the concept of Rights of Nature. This concept is based on Christopher Stone’s 1974 bestseller ‘Should Trees Have Standing?’, which revolutionised environmental thinking in the industrialised West. The book is about the rights of forests, mountains, lakes and rivers, regardless of the benefits we derive from them.
The global movement for the rights of nature resulted in the Whanganui River, sacred to the Māori people, becoming the first body of water in the world to be recognised as a legal entity by the New Zealand government in 2017. River and Rights of Nature were almost simultaneously defined in other places around the world.
My hope is that the screenings of CELULOSA INVASIVA in public spaces and related events will help raise awareness of nature’s inherent rights and prompt discussion about whether these rights should be fought for in the Ulla ecosystem. I would like to provide a printed handout on the Rights of Nature at the events for informational purposes.
Second, in close collaboration with Victor Tenorio Fuertes, I will hold conversations with people who live close to the river Ulla and record them on video. The focus will be on the personal relationships of the individual people to the river. I will use these recordings for the two-channel video work that will be presented in a walk-in sculptural installation at Haus der Kunst in Munich.”
There is a project to build a huge cellulose factory on 366 hectares of land in the centre of Galicia. The factory would quench its thirst for paper and textile fibres with water from the river Ulla: it would need as much water as the entire province of Lugo. Its hunger for raw materials would drive out the native chestnut and oak forests and replace them with eucalyptus monocultures. The deep roots of this invasive species lower the water table and its essential oils cause devastating forest fires – all in all, an ecological disaster for the region’s biodiversity and quality of life.
During my first residency in Do Picho, I made video recordings of the river Ulla and other bodies of water, of intact forests and burned eucalyptus monocultures, and of existing small-scale factories. It was important to me to find an artistic language that is not limited to expressing only the situation in Galicia, but that illuminates the relationship between man and nature more generally.
I will use this material to develop a two-channel video work that will be presented in a walk-in sculptural installation in Munich at Haus der Kunst (where it has been accepted for exhibition in the summer of 2025), and that I plan to present also in Galicia and Spain more broadly.