Page 63 - Urban Kapital New MAY JUNE 2020 ISSUE

THE BEAUTY OF

NATURE REMAINS

ARTICLE WRITTEN BY: CHIARA RAMBALDI

Coyotes have been spotted on the Golden Gate
Bridge in San Francisco. Deer are feeding near the
White House in Washington and nearby the train
stations in Japan. Wild boars have descended the
hills in Barcelona, Spain, and in Bergamo, Italy.
Peacocks have paraded through Bangor in Wales.
Goats and sheep have been viewed on crossroads
in Monmouthshire, Wales. Wild turkeys have been
strolling the streets of Oakland, California. Dolphins
in the Venice’s canals have been tirelessly popping
up, while the sky is finally becoming again the arena
of nature and the real protagonists of the spring are
the flowers that colour the meadows and mountains
of our planet.

But this “hidden” world has always existed both
apart from and alongside our civilization.
While the media keeps reporting tragic death toll
numbers and dramatic emergency situations due to
the current pandemic, the trees are full of harmony, We have visited and seen them before, and that famili-
birds are singing again, and in the avian world, it is arity carries with it a comforting promise of survival and
easier to see how a worm can become an engage- self-reflection. We have for a long time felt pessimistic
ment ring. about the fate of our Earth, but these visions of recovery,
of a resurgence, make our civilization think hard. These
Here is the different world we need right now, the photos, this nature can go back to be our Eden, if we re-
positive news that exists beyond the impulse to ally want it.
scroll through economic saving policies and non-
stop lockdown updates. Let’s not only fall within the impulse that this Covid-19
pandemic is some sort of a revenge act by a violated na-
The natural world’s perfect indifference to the ture, or that nature is taking over what it has been denied
dreadful Coronavirus has always been the best by us and now reclaiming what is rightfully its own.
beauty-cure for humanity’s crisis, but perhaps we
have never been attentive. The beauty of this? That Even if it is reasonably true, the more we view these vid-
the natural world is everywhere, that every living eos, the more they seem to fight the abstract forms of
thing is pursuing its own naturally vital purpose. pessimism and hopelessness. The images nature gives
The great opportunity we have in this challenging us is to open up the concrete possibility to imagine the
moment is step outside and remember how it feels new world that can resist when this crisis will be over, a
to be part of something bigger and timeless, a world perspective that is for us to reflect on how we relate to
that always comes back to where it belongs, a world the natural world, and to one another. Certainly, this pan-
that reaches beyond us but still includes us. demic has taken away so many things from us. It really is
the time to respect nature more, to share the spaces our
The videos and photos of the amazing nature planet offers to everyone without claiming, stealing, nor
flourishing in the most hidden and popular appropriating them.
corners of the world are promising. What is happening right now deserves careful considera-
MAGAZINE // 62 But the sudden truth of these videos and images is tion, to turn this grieving situation into a great opportuni- WWW.POWELLANDBARNSMEDIA.COM MAGAZINE // 63

ty to rebalance our habits and our lives.
that we know these places.