Marzena Skubatz's images osciliate between inner and outer landscapes. She is drawn to themes connected to her personal experiences, such as migration and the question of how environment and identity interact. Her edition on FROM also explores these themes and asks: What does it mean to be foreign? Why is humanity fascinated by the “other,” but unwilling to give it enough space? What does a person identify with — if not with the world they live in?

Wilderness is not a scientific term. On the one hand, we understand it as a natural landscape (neither a scientific term) largely untouched by humans  — currently, about ¼ to a maximum of ⅓ of the global land surface can be defined this way. Another definition of the term is a kind of value judgment. This judgment is based on an arbitrary principle of order and can be negative, meaning “disorderly,” or positive, meaning “untouched” or “innocent.”

Perhaps the fascination with the uncontrollable, and the simultaneous repulsion from it, is at the heart of this tension — the conflict that modern humans have almost fetishized: seeing, touching, and photographing (or, in extreme cases, even destroying) wild animals, untouched landscapes, and unfamiliar plants. The organization Rewilding Oder Delta caters to this need, offering eco-tourists safaris in a landscape attempting to rewild itself. The fewer tourists, the more likely one is to encounter the “Big Seven”: grey seal, European bison, sturgeon, moose, wolf, beaver, and white-tailed eagle.

The NGO is attempting to rewild a 450,000-hectare area around the river delta, stretching from Usedom to just outside Szczecin. The focus on this specific area is due to the Anklamer Stadtbruch, a former drained marshland, which was flooded nearly 30 years ago after a dike breach — and was allowed to remain that way. Today, the majority of the area is owned by the Nabu Foundation, which has returned it to wilderness.

In 2022, photographer Marzena Skubatz documented the work of Rewilding Oder Delta. She and journalist Teresa Kraft traveled to the delta for Greenpeace Magazine to observe the "Big Seven" and assess the current situation. But why does this area rely on attracting eco-tourists?

The reason is simple: In our time, land and everything that exists on it must serve an economic purpose. When an organization purchases land, it must partially refinance it, channel funds into the local community, and thus bring the wilderness closer to the local people. This is why Rewilding Oder Delta hopes that European bisons will make their way through the forests of western Poland to the Oder Delta, where they will not only fulfill their role in the ecosystem but also initially serve as a tourist attraction.

The cultural phenomenon — the desire for wilderness as a healing experience — provides momentum for those committed to saving the planet. After humanity realized that while a healthy planet may limit perpetual growth, it is also the foundation for long-term human existence, various national definitions of wilderness were established to conserve these areas.

New Zealand, for example, defines wilderness as uninhabited areas that require “at least two days' march to cross,” which corresponds to 1,500–5,000 km². In the United States, natural landscapes of at least 20 km², uninhabited by humans — or islands, which may be smaller — fall under the Wilderness Protection Act. In Sweden, areas are classified as “wilderness cores” if they are larger than 1,000 km², more than 15 km away from roads or railway lines, and have no marked hiking trails or tourist facilities.

The restoration of wilderness, like that in the Oder Delta through human initiative, is paradoxical but the last chance to reconstruct habitats for countless species. What was once so heavily manipulated that plants, animals, or even rivers can no longer exist in their original form requires an enormous amount of time and further manipulation and stimulation for re-creation. 

It will take many more years before the giant bison reclaim their original place in the delta. The hope is that the people settled nearby will have grown accustomed to their presence by then. Environmental historian William Cronon argues that a categorical separation of humans and nature is a dangerous ideology that further alienates people from the natural world. According to him, it prevents the ethically and ecologically responsible, sustainable use of wilderness in harmony with human life.

Can humanity learn to adapt to nature again? Does mankind even have enough time left to recreate nature in such a way that it can live with it once more?