Kunstverein Dresden presents Lotte, the first solo exhibition in Germany by Canadian artist Lorna Bauer. Through photography and sculpture, Bauer has developed a meticulously crafted body of work that explores the delicate interplay between glass and analogue photography — two mediums that reflect our complex and ambivalent desire to observe, control, preserve and record the natural world. Rooted in the legacy of Dresden’s 19th-century glass artisans, Leopold and Rudolf Blaschka, Bauer’s work traces intersections between care, scientific inquiry, preservation, and memory.

Curated by the Canadian art historian Marie-Charlotte Carrier the name of the exhibition Lotte is a reference to the pet snail lovingly tended by the Blaschkas in their garden in Dresden. The exhibition draws on this quiet act of care as a lens through which to consider our relationship with the natural world. When Lotte died at the age of eight, the Blaschkas carefully preserved her fragile shell in an ornate box, now held in the collections of the Harvard University. This gesture, driven by intimate attention and scientific curiosity, becomes a poetic anchor in Bauer’s exploration of how we seek to hold nature — to study, protect, and inevitably transform it.

Over the past decades, Bauer has developed a distinctive body of work that is deeply rooted in the processes and materiality of photography, while also embracing a decisively sculptural dimension. Lotte brings together several series of works — some created especially for the exhibition — that explore the complex interplay between the photographic image, the sculptural and historical properties of glass and the shifting qualities of light. Throughout, Lorna Bauer reflects on how these materials shape the ways we see and preserve the natural environment.

Through her work, Lorna Bauer unravels the intertwined histories of glassmaking, photography, and botany, gesturing at the ways these technologies both shaped — and were shaped by — human attempts to control, preserve, and display the natural world.

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In this exhibition, Lorna Bauer draws directly on this heritage and experiments with glass as a material in order to highlight its sculptural possibilities. In a new group of works created especially for the Kunstverein Dresden, she transforms hand mirrors into sculptural objects reminiscent of a cabinet of curiosities. These new works enclose photographs like intimate mementos, stored in fragile glass constructions, reminiscent of both containment and care. Larger glass sculptures, placed directly on the floor, extend this exploration of material and form.