Human’s relationship with nature from early cave paintings to the sixth mass extinction|5th episode

For the first humans who painted bison on the rough surface of hidden caves, nature was more than just having a subject to paint, nature was a fascinating power to observe and be guided by. Art history is littered with countless vistas, sunsets and beauty-spots which were a way to portray wealth but ultimately existed to depict a version or nature as a utopia where humans and its surroundings fitted effortlessly together. 
In this 5th episode of Mayer Pavilion Podcast we hosted the artist Richard Green to discuss how our relationship with nature changed since the first cave paintings. 
Richard Green is an artist, mixed media sculptor born in Cambridge, and currently living and working in Berlin. In his projects he addresses and questions current human issues regarding nature, technology and how to address climate change. He moved to Berlin after studying Fine art at Leeds College of Art in England.
For the exhibition titled "Incomers at Mayer Pavilion" Richard Green exhibited a series of sculptures titled “Earthquake stabilization systems” where three cactus are prepared for the possibility of an earthquake. In this ongoing project even the role of carer for the natural world is questioned, a form of over caring which is flawed.

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The term nature is a man-made word which creates a divide between humans and the natural world furthering the distance between both.
The idea of ‘nature’ is the core of science, however, while nature preservation has become a major social concern today the idea of “nature” remains unresolved. If we take a look the origin of the word Nature we see that the meaning, the etymology and the semantics changed throughout the history of European languages. In the occidental meanings, “nature”, is opposed to humans, currently used in public policies. 
Since the 60s, the scientific and political community, started to alert with the necessity of “protecting nature”, we have seen the “environmental movement” due to preserve wilderness, and control pollution. 
Then in the 80s we have “Conservation Biology“ theory which address the loss of biological diversity. 
Many close and successful new technical words have been born in the same lexical field, such as “ecosystem”, “biodiversity”, “biosphere”, “Gaia” etc…  but The word “nature” still remain an abstract concept. 
The apparition of the word has been traced back in Greek, phusis that means “growing, and producing”. 
Aristotle founder of most “natural sciences” defines nature as the essence of things or what they are made of: the nature of a tree is wood. 
With the Christianization of the Roman Empire we have a new vision of the word nature seen as “creation” creation of god, the monotheistic view, where god transcend nature therefore also humans, while in Greek view even the gods were part of nature in the polytheistic point of view. 
In Plato’s dualism point of view distinguish material word to spirit word, and god was no more found in nature but beyond it. 
So Nature was then no more viewed as sacred but rather seen as raw material given to men to make whatever they want “make the earth full and be masters of it; be rulers over […] every living thing moving on the earth […]: they will be for your food” (Genesis, 1, 28).