Hulda & Lilli

Hulda & Lilli is a large-scale installation that combines photographs, text, and video. Hulda & Lilli are a hungry chameleon carrying eggs and a resilient locust who loves flowers. Their two stories explore human nature and our biases. As a viewer, you must first choose which route to take in the exhibition, as the artwork can be experienced in two different ways — through two separate corridors. Both corridors ultimately lead to the same video projection, which presents a scene of conflict between the protagonists.

The photographs may appear innocent and cute, but the work is anything but that. Hulda & Lilli aims to make us aware that empathy is not only an innate behavior but also a learned one, shaped and reinforced — or diminished — by narratives and arguments. The work highlights how we can be primed to empathize with almost anything, whether a lizard-like creature or one with an exoskeleton.

To create Hulda & Lilli, Tammi collaborated with biologists, a media researcher, a psychologist, and a neuroscientist. The result is an installation that, at times quite cruelly, plays with our emotions.