The Lives of Animals, Salt edition
‘The Lives of Animals’ is a group exhibition at Salt that looks at the subject of animals from the perspective of the visual arts.
The Lives of Animals explores the evolving relationship between humans and animals throughout history—from coexistence to systems of domination. The exhibition takes its name from the novel by South African writer J. M. Coetzee and draws inspiration from his powerful critique of anthropocentric perspectives, investigating empathy and kindness toward animals.
At the heart of the exhibition is the work of Lin May Saeed, the German-Iraqi artist and activist who passed away in 2023. Known for her satirical yet poignant depictions of human animals relationships, Saeed’s work is presented alongside contributions by artists from Türkiye and different geographies. The selection also features an archival project centered on the stray dogs of Istanbul. The exhibition begins with Sonic Space, located in the Forum area of Salt Beyoğlu, extending across the second and third floors and concluding in the Winter Garden. Composed of field recordings and sound works by artists working at the intersection of musicology, eco-acoustics, and zoomusicology, this space centers the auditory worlds of animals, offering a site for reflection on interspecies communication through both artistic and scientific lenses. A two-part, site-specific mural by David Maroto interrogates established narratives around domestication, social hierarchy, and the continuity of human-nature relationships—particularly through references to animal iconography from Çatalhöyük.
Moving images, paintings, and installations examine themes such as species-based domination, animal liberation, ecological responsibility, and cultural hybridity. Between Care and Violence: The Dogs of Istanbul by researcher and activist Mine Yıldırım traces the discourses, spatial politics, administrative and legal processes shaping the lives of dogs in Istanbul since 1910, when over 80,000 street dogs were exiled to Sivriada, the city’s smallest and most remote island. Drawing on a range of archival documents, the work presents a chronology that reveals both the shifting forms of violence enacted against dogs and the culture of care and protection as a countervailing force. Featuring embroidery, etching, and textile works, the last chapter of the exhibition shifts focus to the intertwined themes of care, control, mourning, resistance, and ecological collapse in human-animal relations, as well as individual and collective struggles for nature and animal rights.
The Lives of Animals is realized in collaboration with the Museum of Contemporary Art Antwerp (M HKA) as part of L’Internationale’s Museum of the Commons program.
Artists: Apian, Noor Abuarafeh, Pierre Bismuth, melanie bonajo, Elen Braga, Sue Coe, Golden Snail Opera Collective (Isabelle Carbonell, Joelle Chevrier, Yen-Ling Tsai, Anna Tsing), Elmas Deniz, Simone Forti, Piero Giraldi, Laura Lima, Dafna Maimon, Britta Marakatt-Labba, David Maroto, Ad Minoliti, Füsun Onur, Jean Painlevé, Janis Rafa, Maria Roza, Necla Rüzgar, Lin May Saeed, Uriburu
Sonic Space: Cevdet Erek, Nathan Gray, Kathy High, John C. Lilly, Charlemaigne Palestine and Simone Forti, Dr. Roger Payne, Dr. Joyce Poole and Peter Granli, Lisa Schonberg, Jana Winderen
Research Project: Mine Yıldırım

Lin May Saeed, Seven sleepers, courtest Jacky Stentz
Related activities
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–SALT
Sound of Green
‘Warm Earth Sounds for Plants and the People Who Love Them’ at Salt in Istanbul begins on 5 June, World Environment Day, with Özcan Ertek’s installation ‘Sound of Green’.
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–SALT
Warm Earth Sounds for Plants and the People Who Love Them
‘Warm Earth Sounds for Plants and the People Who Love Them’ is a series of sound installations by Özcan Ertek, Fulya Uçanok, Ömer Sarıgedik, Zeynep Ayşe Hatipoğlu, and Passepartout Duo, presented at Salt in Istanbul.
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–M HKA
Apple. An Introduction (over and over and once again)
‘Apple. An Introduction (over and over and once again)’ by Antje Majewski and Paweł Freisler is the second part of the Superhost project at M HKA. Curated by Joanna Zielińska and Anne-Claire Schmitz, it includes guest works by Chantal Akerman, Agnieszka Polska, Jimmie Durham, Ian Hamilton Finlay, Joris de Rycke, Kasper De Vos and many more.
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–M HKA
The Lives of Animals
‘The Lives of Animals’ is a group exhibition at M HKA that looks at the subject of animals from the perspective of the visual arts.
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HDK-Valand
Climate Forum I
The Climate Forum is a space of dialogue and exchange with respect to the concrete operational practices being implemented within the art field in response to climate change and ecological degradation. This is the first in a series of meetings hosted by HDK-Valand within L'Internationale's Museum of the Commons programme.
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–Van Abbemuseum
The Soils Project
‘The Soils Project’ is part of an eponymous, long-term research initiative involving TarraWarra Museum of Art (Wurundjeri Country, Australia), the Van Abbemuseum (Eindhoven, Netherlands) and Struggles for Sovereignty, a collective based in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. It works through specific and situated practices that consider soil, as both metaphor and matter.
Seeking and facilitating opportunities to listen to diverse voices and perspectives around notions of caring for land, soil and sovereign territories, the project has been in development since 2018. An international collaboration between three organisations, and several artists, curators, writers and activists, it has manifested in various iterations over several years. The group exhibition ‘Soils’ at the Van Abbemuseum is part of Museum of the Commons. -
–Museo Reina Sofia
Sustainable Art Production
The Studies Center of Museo Reina Sofía will publish an open call for four residencies of artistic practice for projects that address the emergencies and challenges derived from the climate crisis such as food sovereignty, architecture and sustainability, communal practices, diasporas and exiles or ecological and political sustainability, among others.
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–tranzit.ro
Non-Western Technologies for the Good Life
The experimental course ‘Non-Western Technologies for the Good Life’ (November 2023–May 2024) celebrates as its starting point the anniversary of 50 years since the publication of Tools for Conviviality, considering that Ivan Illich’s call is as relevant as ever.
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–Moderna galerijaZRC SAZU
Open Call – Summer School: Our Many Easts
Our Many Easts summer school takes place in Ljubljana 24–30 August and the application deadline is 15 March. Courses will be held in English and cover topics such as the legacy of the Eastern European avant-gardes, archives as tools of emancipation, the new “non-aligned” networks, art in times of conflict and war, ecology and the environment.
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–Institute of Radical Imagination
Gathering into the Maelstrom
‘Gathering into the Maelstrom’ in Venice at Sale Docks is a four-day programme curated by Institute of Radical Imagination (IRI) and Sale Docks.
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–Institute of Radical Imagination
Gathering into the Maelstrom (exhibition)
‘Gathering into the Maelstrom’ is curated by Institute of Radical Imagination and Sale Docks within the framework of Museum of the Commons.
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–Museo Reina Sofia
Open Call: Research Residencies
The Centro de Estudios of Museo Reina Sofía releases its open call for research residencies as part of the climate thread within the Museum of the Commons programme.
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HDK-Valand
Climate Forum II
The Climate Forum is a series of online meetings hosted by HDK-Valand within L’Internationale’s Museum of the Commons programme. The series builds upon earlier research resulting in the (2022) book Climate: Our Right to Breathe and reaches toward emerging change practices.
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HDK-Valand
Climate Forum III
The Climate Forum is a series of online meetings hosted by HDK-Valand within L’Internationale’s Museum of the Commons programme. The series builds upon earlier research resulting in the (2022) book Climate: Our Right to Breathe and reaches toward emerging change practices.
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–M HKA
The Geopolitics of Infrastructure
The exhibition The Geopolitics of Infrastructure presents the work of a generation of artists bringing contemporary perspectives on the particular topicality of infrastructure in a transnational, geopolitical context.
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–MACBAMuseo Reina Sofia
School of Common Knowledge 2025
The second iteration of the School of Common Knowledge will bring together international participants, faculty from the confederation and situated organisations in Barcelona and Madrid.
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–SALT
The Lives of Animals, Salt edition
‘The Lives of Animals’ is a group exhibition at Salt that looks at the subject of animals from the perspective of the visual arts.
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–SALT
Plant(ing) Entanglements
The series of sound installations Warm Earth Sounds for Plants and the People Who Love Them ends with Fulya Uçanok’s sound installation Plant(ing) Entanglements.
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–Museo Reina Sofia
Sustainable Art Production. Research Residencies
The projects selected in the first call of the Sustainable Art Practice research residencies are A hores d'ara. Experiences and memory of the defense of the Huerta valenciana through its archive by the group of researchers Anaïs Florin, Natalia Castellano and Alba Herrero; and Fundamental Errors by the filmmaker and architect Mauricio Freyre.
Related contributions and publications
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Climate Forum I – Readings
Nkule MabasoThe Climate ForumClimateHDK-ValandEN es -
Theorising More-Than Human Collectives for Climate Change Action in Museums
Fiona R. Cameron -
Climate: Our Right to Breathe
ClimateThe Climate Forum -
Late Subatlantic. Science Poetry in Times of Global Warming
Ursula Biemann -
Monoculture – A Recent History
M HKA -
Decolonial aesthesis: weaving each other
Charles Esche, Rolando Vázquez, Teresa Cos RebolloThe Soils ProjectClimateVan Abbemuseum -
…and the Earth along. Tales about the making, remaking and unmaking of the world.
Martin Pogačar... and the Earth alongClimatePast in the Present -
Art for Radical Ecologies Manifesto
Institute of Radical ImaginationArt for Radical Ecologies ManifestoClimateInstitute of Radical Imagination -
Pollution as a Weapon of War
Svitlana MatviyenkoClimate -
A Letter Inside a Letter: How Labor Appears and Disappears
Marwa ArsaniosThe Climate ForumClimate -
Apricots from Damascus
Atıf Akın, Dilek WinchesterSALTEN tr ar -
Seeds Shall Set Us Free II
Munem WasifThe Climate ForumClimate -
Pollution as a Weapon of War – a conversation with Svitlana Matviyenko
Svitlana MatviyenkoClimateClimate book launchHDK-Valand -
Françoise Vergès – Breathing: A Revolutionary Act
Françoise VergèsClimateClimate book launchHDK-Valand -
Ana Teixeira Pinto – Fire and Fuel: Energy and Chronopolitical Allegory
Ana Teixeira PintoClimateClimate book launchHDK-Valand -
Watery Histories – a conversation between artists Katarina Pirak Sikku and Léuli Eshrāghi
Léuli Eshrāghi, Katarina Pirak SikkuClimateClimate book launchHDK-Valand -
Preservation of the Commons: Responsibilities of the Institutions
Futurefarmers/Amy Franceschini, Aslıhan DemirtaşDialoguesSALT -
Potential of the Totality: Machine Learning for A Longer Relationship With Archives
Refik Anadol, Kenric McDowellDialoguesSALT -
Omuz: A Solidarity Network
OMUZSALT -
VOTI. Union of the Imaginary
SALT -
Indra's Web
Vandana Singh... and the Earth alongPast in the PresentClimateZRC SAZU -
One Day, Freedom Will Be
Françoise Vergès, Maddalena FragnitoArt for Radical Ecologies ManifestoTowards Collective Study in Times of EmergencyInstitute of Radical ImaginationClimate -
Art and Materialisms: At the intersection of New Materialisms and Operaismo
Emanuele BragaArt for Radical Ecologies ManifestoInstitute of Radical ImaginationClimate -
Dispatch: Harvesting Non-Western Epistemologies (ongoing)
Adelina LuftClimatetranzit.ro -
Dispatch: Practicing Conviviality
Ana BarbuClimatetranzit.ro -
Dispatch: Notes on Separation and Conviviality
Raluca PopaSituated OrganizationsClimatetranzit.ro -
Dispatch: The Arrow of Time
Catherine MorlandClimatetranzit.ro -
To Build an Ecological Art Institution: The Experimental Station for Research on Art and Life
Ovidiu Ţichindeleanu, Raluca VoineaArt for Radical Ecologies ManifestoClimateSituated Organizationstranzit.ro -
Dispatch: A Shared Dialogue
Irina Botea Bucan, Jon DeanClimatetranzit.ro -
Art, Radical Ecologies and Class Composition: On the possible alliance between historical and new materialisms
Marco BaravalleArt for Radical Ecologies ManifestoInstitute of Radical ImaginationClimate -
‘Territorios en resistencia’, Artistic Perspectives from Latin America
Rosa Jijón & Francesco Martone (A4C), Sofía Acosta Varea, Boloh Miranda Izquierdo, Anamaría GarzónArt for Radical Ecologies ManifestoClimateInstitute of Radical Imagination -
Unhinging the Dual Machine: The Politics of Radical Kinship for a Different Art Ecology
Federica TimetoArt for Radical Ecologies ManifestoInstitute of Radical ImaginationClimate -
Cultivating Abundance
Åsa SonjasdotterThe Climate ForumClimatePast in the Present -
Climate Forum II – Readings
Nkule Mabaso, Nick AikensThe Climate ForumClimateHDK-Valand -
Eating clay is not an eating disorder
Zayaan KhanThe Climate ForumRecette. Reset. Recipes in and Beyond the InstitutionClimatePast in the Present -
Graduation
Koleka PutumaThe Climate ForumClimate -
Depression
Gargi BhattacharyyaThe Climate ForumClimate -
Climate Forum III – Readings
Yolande Zola Zoli van der HeideThe Climate ForumClimate -
Soils
The Soils ProjectClimateVan Abbemuseum -
Dispatch: There is grief, but there is also life
Cathryn KlastoThe Climate ForumClimate -
Beyond Distorted Realities: Palestine, Magical Realism and Climate Fiction
Sanabel Abdel RahmanTowards Collective Study in Times of EmergencyPast in the PresentClimate -
Dispatch: Care Work is Grief Work
Abril Cisneros RamírezThe Climate ForumClimate -
Reading List: Lives of Animals
Joanna ZielińskaClimateM HKA -
Sonic Room: Translating Animals
Joanna Zielińska... and the Earth alongClimate -
Encounters with Ecologies of the Savannah – Aadaajii laɗɗe
Katia Golovko... and the Earth alongClimate