Swiss artist installs 300 trees in football stadium

Basel-based artist Klaus Littmann has transformed a 30,000-capacity stadium in southern Austria into a forest as part of an exhibit paying tribute to nature.

It is Austria’s largest public art installation.

The exhibit, “For Forest: the unending attraction of nature”, opens on September 8 at the Wörthersee football stadium in Klagenfurt, Austria near the border of Slovenia and Italy.

The installation by Littmann was inspired by a pencil drawing of Austrian artist Max Peintner.

The exhibit includes the installation of 300 trees, some weighing up to six tonnes each, which were carefully transplanted over the football pitch. Over the two months of the exhibit, visitors can expect to see natural changes with the seasons including the leaves changing colours and wildlife build a habitat in the forest.

After the exhibit closes on October 27, 2019, the forest will be carefully replanted on a public site near the stadium as a “living forest sculpture.”

Photos: EPA-EFE/CHRISTIAN BRUNA