What do plants mean to human beings? 

With around 130 exhibits, the exhibition 'Green Modernism: The New View of Plants' takes us back to the early twentieth century and examines the depiction of plants in the arts and how they were viewed in botany. After all, as plain as potted plants in pictures may appear at first glance, and as matter-of-fact as botanical reports read, they always also attest to the contradictions, fears, longings, and ideologies of the modern age.

Artists: Hans Arp, Max Baur, Arthur Benda, Aenne Biermann, Karl Blossfeldt, Otto Dix, Alfred Eisenstaedt, Hugo Erfurth, Max Ernst, Otto Feldmann, Ernst Fuhrmann, Albert and Richard Theodor Gottheil, Erich Heckel, Heinrich Hoerle, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Werner Mantz, Franz Pichler Jr., Anton Räderscheidt, Albert Renger-Patzsch, Ludwig Ernst Ronig, August Sander, Karl Schenker, Karl Schmidt-Rottluff, Richard Seewald, Friedrich Seidenstücker, Franz Wilhelm Seiwert, Renée Sintenis, Carl Strüwe. Also featuring: Marta Astfalck-Vietz, Jagadish Chandra Bose, Comedian Harmonists, Lili Elbe, Wilhelm Murnau, Max Reichmann, Christian Warlich, and others.

'Green Modernism: The New View of Plants' is a pilot project in eco-curating for the Museum Ludwig. Cultural institutions want and need to establish new environmental standards for their operations—especially museums, which are among the major CO2 emitters in the cultural sector with air conditioning, lighting, travel, and shipping. Green Modernism: The New View of Plants will explore the possibilities for presenting sustainable exhibitions and make them transparent.