The difference between a human and a bird
15.10.2025
Dominik Fleischmann
Location → Höyrymyllyntie 11, Oulu
The work is on display until 20.9.
Dominik Fleischmann’s Leaf Print Garden is an interactive art installation where visitors are invited to create photographs on leaves, in memory of the companions who nurture us.
The work is a combination of urban garden and alternative photography workshop that opens up new perspectives on plants, companionship and sunlight, through the tender chlorophyll process.
The outdoor installation features an arrangement of wooden planter boxes where pollinator friendly flowers and large leaved plants grow. What makes these boxes unique is their additional function as a print making station. Chlorophyll printing is an alternative photographic technique making use of photosynthesis, where a photographic image is developed on a leaf. In this natural process the picture is exposed directly through sunlight on plant or tree leaves.
It is a living installation, thriving on the curiosity of many. Visitors, young and old, become caretakers, artists, and explorers. Visitors are encouraged to water the plants and create their own photographs of a companion (human and not) who they would like to remember in a leaf. The final leaf artworks can be taken home or exhibited in the garden’s gallery. While the abundance of leaves can be utilised by human visitors to create organic photographs, the flowers and fruiting bodies are meant for the local wildlife and pollinators as an invitation to feast on whatever the little garden has to offer.
The artist’s wish for this installation is that people will revisit the Leaf Print Garden often, become familiar with the different plants and engage in a multi-species dialogue: By creating their personal stories on leaves—and in return, give back to the garden by nurturing the plants.
Accessibility
Accessibility for people with reduced mobility: The work is located at Hamina-Villen Leikkipaikka, Höyrymyllyntie 11. The route leading to the work is asphalt and a dirt road. The nearest parking lot is located on Höyrymyllyntie. The nearest benches are near the work, at the playground.
Accessibility with the senses: The work can be experienced by sight and touch.
Image gallery
Artist:
Dominik Fleischmann
Dominik Fleischmann (b. 1989, Germany) is a visual artist and doctoral researcher at the University of the Arts, Academy of Fine Arts in Helsinki. Before and after his photography studies in Germany and Finland, he worked in animal sanctuaries across the globe, researching the relationship between humans and other animals. His work seeks to find ethical ways of interacting with nature that inform ecological and alternative ways of creating and exhibiting art. Dominik’s projects immerse photographic methods and more-than-human agency and are rooted in the search of ethics, justice and care for the breathing world.
