Adnan arrived Scandinavia in 1982.
In his native country, an infrastructure such as an airport, would never have been established in a green, fertile landscape as were Adnans plane landed.
Adnan spent days and weeks, hiking in the woods.
Trying to understand the landscapes and nature, was both an escape and a way of coping with posttraumatic stress.
Trying to understand the landscapes and nature, was both an escape and a way of coping with posttraumatic stress.
He collected all kind of plants, trees, grass, ferns and moss. It was all used to re-establish a forest-like environment in an abandoned industrial building.
This indoor area contained rocks and pebbles, moss, humus, nutrient solution containers and circulation systems.
Discarded street lighting gave a seasonal cycle without winter. The indoor climate at the site was regulated by excess heat from a local industry nearby.
Adnan created an indoor, secret arboretum.
He modelled enlargements of pollen grains as a part of his project.
Adnans work gave a pollen-archive and a semi autonomous arboretum, were the principle of selection was based only upon Adnans subjective and emotional relation to the forest.
A forest giving an extreme contrast to the landscape were he grew up, but still a place for contemplation and rest.
Adnan has not been in Scandinavia after a journy to Lebanon, 1999.
The name Adnan is arabic. It means ”one who is settled”
How can I know all this?
I know Adnan. I worked with him. I listened to him in the lunchbreaks, as he told me about his native country, the music he was listening to, and the books he was reading.
I visited his Arboretum several times, as I always woundered where his ideas came from.
