Ecological art, also known as ecoart, represents an artistic genre and practice dedicated to the preservation, remediation, and revitalization of Earth's diverse life forms, natural resources, and ecological systems. Practitioners of ecological art apply ecosystemic principles to living species and their habitats across the lithosphere, atmosphere, biosphere, and hydrosphere, encompassing wilderness, rural, suburban, and urban environments. This genre distinguishes itself from Environmental art through its engagement in functional ecological systems restoration, alongside socially engaged, activist, and community-based interventions. Furthermore, ecological art examines the political, cultural, economic, ethical, and aesthetic dimensions that influence ecosystemic conditions. Its practitioners comprise artists, scientists, philosophers, and activists, who frequently collaborate on projects focused on restoration, remediation, and public awareness initiatives.
Historical Precedents
Art historical antecedents encompass environmental art, earthworks, land art, sustainable art, landscape painting, and landscape photography. Although historical examples may extend to the Neolithic era, a concise compilation of seminal works, as documented in the publication Ecovention: current art to transform ecologies, features Herbert Bayer's Grass Mound (1955) at the Aspen Art Institute in Aspen, Colorado; Joseph Beuys's 1962 proposal for the remediation of the Elbe River in Hamburg, Germany; Hans Haacke's 1965 manifesto advocating for time-based, "natural," dynamic indeterminate art; Nicolas Uriburu's 1968 performance "Green Power, coloration Grand Canal – Venice"; and Agnes Denes's 1968 performance, Haiku Poetry Burial, Rice Planting and Tree Chaining/Exercises in Eco-Logic, conducted in Sullivan County, New York.
The year 1969 marked a pivotal period for the development of ecological art practices. Significant achievements from this period include Haacke's Grass Grows in Ithaca, New York; Alan Sonfist's initiatives highlighting the importance of indigenous forests within urban environments; and his efforts to monitor air quality in New York City. Concurrently, Betty Beaumont documented the remediation of the most severe U.S. ocean oil spill off the coast of Santa Barbara, California, while Mierle Laderman Ukeles authored the Manifesto for Maintenance Art (Spaid). Also in 1969, the John Gibson Gallery in New York City presented the "Ecologic Art" exhibition, featuring works by Will Insley, Claes Oldenburg, Christo, Peter Hutchinson, Dennis Oppenheim, Robert Morris, Robert Smithson, Carl Andre, Jan Dibbets, and Richard Long.
Between 1969 and 1970, Helen Mayer Harrison and Newton Harrison collaborated on a global mapping initiative for endangered species. Subsequently, from 1972 to 1979, the Harrisons developed seven distinct projects focused on the lagoons of California.
In 1971, artist Bonnie Sherk performed Public Lunch with the Animals within the Lion House at the San Francisco Zoo. Subsequently, she established The Farm, also known as Crossroads Community, in San Francisco in 1974. This initiative encompassed the cultivation of edible crops as environmental sculpture, the raising of livestock, and functioned as both a performance art venue and a community education center.
György Kepes's 1972 essay, Art and Ecological Consciousness, featured in his book Arts of the Environment, delineates ecological art as a genre distinct from environmental art. Similarly, in the 1992 exhibition and accompanying book, Fragile Ecologies: Contemporary Artists' Interpretations and Solutions, art historian Dr. Barbara Matilsky distinguished ecological art from environmental art by emphasizing the former's ethical foundations. A workshop and exhibition specifically addressing ecological systems and art were presented in 1993 by Don Krug, Renee Miller, and Barbara Westfall at the Society for Ecological Restoration in Irvine, California. The neologism ecovention, a portmanteau of "ecology" and "intervention," emerged in 1999 in conjunction with an exhibition of the same title curated by Amy Lipton and Sue Spaid. This term describes artistic projects employing innovative strategies to physically alter local ecologies. In a 2006 UNESCO research report titled "Mapping the Terrain of Contemporary EcoArt Practice and Collaboration," prepared for the Art in Ecology think tank on arts and sustainability, artist Beth Carruthers employed the term "Ecoart."
The EcoArt Network, an international collective of artists established in 1998, has collaboratively formulated a contemporary definition of ecological art. This practice is characterized by its commitment to an ethic of social justice, evident in both its thematic content and the materials or forms employed. Ecological art aims to foster empathy and reverence, initiate discourse, and promote the sustained well-being of both human societies and natural ecosystems. Its manifestations frequently include socially engaged, activist, community-oriented restorative, or interventionist artistic endeavors.
In recent times, contemporary artists such as Parvez M. Taj and Eve Mosher have increasingly adopted ecological art as their primary mode of artistic expression.
Theories
The 2012 publication, Toward Global (Environ)Mental Change – Transformative Art and Cultures of Sustainability, posits that the global challenge of unsustainability represents a fundamental disruption to the hardware of civilization, alongside a concurrent crisis within the software of human cognition. Furthermore, Art and Climate Change: Separate Bubbles or Mutual Membrane? delineates three primary impediments to environmentally conscious transformation—specifically, detrimental 'memes', 'Radical Inertia', and 'Framed Questions'—and investigates the potential function of eco-art in identifying and mitigating these barriers. The 2004 volume, Ecological aesthetics: art in environmental design: theory and practice, offers an examination of diverse trends and methodologies within landscape architecture, science, and theoretical frameworks that have influenced landscape research and modification for more than three decades. Additionally, the Green Arts Web, curated by Carnegie Mellon University senior librarian Mo Dawley, serves as a comprehensive collection of essential texts on contemporary environmental art, ecological art, and related theories spanning from the 20th century to the present. This resource encompasses various sub-categories, including deep ecology practices, ecofeminism, ecopsychology, land ethic and bioregionalism, the concept of place, and systems thinking.
Principles
Practitioners operating within this artistic domain typically adhere to one or more of the subsequent principles:
- Focus on the intricate network of interrelationships within environmental contexts, encompassing the physical, biological, cultural, political, and historical dimensions of ecological systems.
- Create artistic endeavors that utilize natural materials or interact with environmental phenomena, including wind, water, or solar radiation.
- Reclaim, rehabilitate, and remediate compromised ecological environments.
- Inform the general populace regarding ecological processes and the pressing environmental challenges confronting society.
- Revise existing ecological relationships by innovatively proposing novel paradigms for coexistence, sustainability, and environmental restoration.
Approaches
Ecological art encompasses a multitude of diverse methodologies, specifically:
- Representational artwork: This approach conveys information and contextual conditions through the creation of images and objects, aiming to stimulate critical discourse.
- Remediation projects: These initiatives focus on reclaiming or restoring environments that have been polluted or disrupted. Artists engaged in such projects frequently collaborate with environmental scientists, landscape architects, and urban planners.
- Activist and protest art: This category seeks to engage, inform, galvanize, and instigate shifts in behaviors and/or public policy.
- Social sculptures: These are socially engaged, time-based artistic endeavors that involve communities in the observation and assessment of their local landscapes, fostering participatory roles in sustainable practices and lifestyles.
- Ecopoetic art: This form aims to re-envision the natural world, thereby inspiring harmonious coexistence with other species.
- Direct encounter artworks: These works leverage natural phenomena, including water, meteorological conditions, sunlight, and botanical elements.
- Didactic or pedagogical works: These pieces disseminate information concerning environmental injustice and ecological issues, such as water and soil pollution and associated health hazards, primarily through educational means.
- Lived-and-relational aesthetics: This approach encompasses sustainable, off-grid, and permaculture-based modes of existence.
Orientations
Contemporary ecological art has been conceptualized by interdisciplinary and academic communities through the lens of life-centered concerns, community engagement, public discourse, and ecological sustainability. In 1996, educator and activist Don Krug identified recurring concepts employed by ecological artists, which serve as interpretive frameworks for understanding ecological perspectives and practices.
The subsequent four orientations were delineated: environmental design, ecological design, ecological restoration, and social restoration.
- Certain artists utilize natural elements as primary resources for specific aesthetic pursuits. Practitioners focused on environmental design aim to realize distinct formal aesthetic outcomes. During the 1980s and 1990s, a multidisciplinary convergence emerged, with artists, architects, designers, and civil engineers investigating methodologies to integrate art, aesthetics, ecology, and cultural considerations.
- Artists engaged in ecological design produce works intrinsically linked to direct experiences and interactions within the specific site of their creation. This ecological perspective on design situates the artwork within broader frameworks, examining the intricate interconnections among humans, flora, fauna, the specific location, and the planetary ecosystem.
- Certain artists endeavor to raise public awareness regarding environmental challenges and degradation through rigorous scientific inquiry and comprehensive educational documentation. Their objectives include the restoration of vulnerable ecosystems and the enlightenment of the public concerning the systemic nature of bioregions, often employing communication strategies, ritualistic practices, and performative interventions. Furthermore, some ecological artists directly involve individuals in participatory activities or actions, challenging ecologically detrimental practices by foregrounding social, ethical, and moral ecological imperatives.
- Social restoration is predicated on an ecological ethic that posits human existence within a reciprocal relationship with broader biotic communities, thereby catalyzing socially responsible artistic endeavors. Socio-ecological artists undertake a critical analysis of quotidian experiences. They meticulously investigate power dynamics that engender communal discord pertaining to ecological concerns.
Ecofeminist art
- Ecofeminist art
- Environmental art
- Land art
- Sustainable design
- Ecological design
- Arnold Berleant
- Zeng Fanren
- Nicola Perullo
References
Bibliography
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- Beardsley, John. Earthworks and Beyond: Contemporary Art in the Landscape. Abbeville Press, 1989 and 2008.
- Berleant, Arnold, ed. Environment and the Arts. Ashgate, 2002.
- Braddock, Alan C. A Keener Perception: Ecocritical Studies in American Art History. University of Alabama Press, 2009.
- Boetzkes, Amanda. The Ethics of Earth Art. Minneapolis; London: University of Minnesota Press, 2010.
- Brown, Andrew. Art & Ecology Now. Thames & Hudson, 2014.
- Cheetham, Mark A. Landscape into Eco Art: Articulations of Nature since the '60s. Penn State UP, 2018.
- Demos, T.J., and Francesco Manacorda. Radical Nature: Art and Architecture for a Changing Planet. Walter Koenig, 2010.
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- Miles, Malcolm. Eco-Aesthetics: Art, Literature and Architecture in a Period of Climate Change (Radical Aesthetics, Radical Art). 2014.
- Smith, Stephanie, and Victor Margolin, eds. Beyond Green, Smart Museum of Art. 2007.
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- Strelow, Heike. Ecological Aesthetics: Art in Environmental Design: Theory and Practice. Initiated by Herman Prigann. Birkhäuser, 2004.
- Szerszyski, B., W. Heim, and C. Waterton. Nature Performed: Environment, Culture and Performance. Blackwell, 2003.
- ecoartnetwork.org