Curiosity and Control

A visual tour of major natural history museums and zoos in Western capital cities, guided by the narrative voices of historians, architects, musicologists, and zoo directors as they reflect on our complex relationship with nature. Wonder, curiosity, control, protection: the key concepts in this documentary that investigates the thin line between love of nature and the will to dominate it. A central figure is the legendary explorer and taxidermist Carl Akeley and his dioramas in New York, which were created as a kind of zoo where humans could come into contact with nature. But can nature be reconstructed? And if so, for whom?