Year: 2026.

Technique: Mixed media, clay relief, print (poetry) on paper 100 × 70 cm, objects in space (soybeans), dried insects (collected dead in the forest)
Dimensions: 1.5 × 3 m (dimensions are not strictly defined)
Exhibited in MSU (Museum of Contemporary Art in Zagreb), as part of the group exhibition Natura Po_etica, curated by Suzana Marjanić and Nataša Ivančević, in collaboration with Jasmina Fučkan

At the centre of the spatial installation are modelled continents, partly made of edible material and partly of clay. At the opening, the audience is invited to taste the edible part of the work. Each continent bears an inscribed percentage of destroyed nature—a concrete trace of human impact: North America has lost 39% of its forest habitat, South America 95%, Africa 76%, and India and Oceania 60%. Forests, meadows, clearings, wetlands, and mountains are a home we share, yet we do not protect them equally for all living beings. Within this space, alongside deforestation and the transformation of landscapes into resources, pesticides are also present—particularly devastating to pollinators. Diversity is being erased by monocultures, light pollution is increasingly visible, and with rising carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere, sudden and unexpected temperature changes are becoming more frequent. With the disappearance of insects, we lose this incredible energy that drives, remembers, and sustains the cycle of life.

A part of the work is also my poetry, through which I attempted to describe the fading of the song of crickets in the New Zagreb neighbourhood where I grew up.

I have been collecting dead insects I found in forests around Zagreb over the past two years. In my neighbourhood, I mostly found dead bumblebees, while in the forests I found hoverflies, rose chafers, dragonflies, and even a carpenter bee, which is more commonly seen in the Dalmatia region.

Zrikanje između grudi

dok lete, pužu i preobražaju se, utrobe drveća nestaju,
blijedi pod ticalima humus,
utišava se izvor vode,
po zemlji su narasli gusti krtičnjaci boli

uporne nožice traže stabla u čeličnom gradu,
smokva na livadi, nudi im raspadajući obrok.

pare se u kasno ljeto a jaja liježu na jesen

pjevaju o nama, kojima ostaje osama što vrišti i kuća od kostiju da vučemo za sobom.

zrikanje pospremam između grudi, da mi ugrije umnjake i koljena u prosincu.

Chirping Between the Breasts

as they fly, crawl, and transform, the wombs of trees disappear,
black humus fades beneath antennae,
the spring of water falls silent,
dense molehills of pain have risen across the soil.

persistent little legs search for trees in a steel city,
a fig tree offers them a decaying meal.

they mate in late summer and lay eggs in autumn,

they sing about us—
to whom remains a screaming solitude
and a house of bones to drag behind us,

I tuck the chirping between my breasts,
to warm my wisdom teeth and knees in December.