Exit or Activism?

Symposium on Sustainability and Contemporary Art: Exit or Activism?

This symposium investigates the current state of thinking about sustainability in the light of the continuing mutations of post-Fordist global capitalism and its devastating effects on the environment, society and the individual. The axis of discussion will revolve around the strategic possibilities for resistance offered by tactical withdrawal versus relentless activism through contemporary art. On the one hand, the dilemma gives rise to a conscious decision to slow down, decline to participate, to seek a way out, or ‘exit’ as envisioned by Paulo Virno, or on the other, there is a passion to overcome political exhaustion and confront head on rampant injustice, environmental degradation and lack of liberty.

SPEAKERS
Emanuel Danesch is based in Vienna. As a poly-media artist in the broadest sense his projects and documentary films cover issues of cultural, economical and political transformation. At the symposium he will present his new film LiveSafelyinEurope.

Maja and Reuben Fowkes are curators and art historians who deal with issues of memory, ecology and translocal exchange.  They have curated and written extensively on the issue of contemporary art and sustainability. blog

Ivan Ladislav Galeta is an artist and head of the multi-media department at the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb. He is a noted avant-garde film maker, conceptual artist and explorer of sustainable practices.  He will present his NOART EARTH DAY project at the symposium.

Gene Ray is a critic and theorist living in Berlin and working at the intersections of art and radical politics. He is a member of the Radical Culture Research Collective, author of Terror and the Sublime in Art and Critical Theory (2005) and editor of Joseph Beuys: Mapping the Legacy (2000). His presentation is entitled ‘Exit, Radical Culture and the Re-Composition of Struggle.’

Oliver Ressler is an artist and filmmaker based in Vienna, who organizes theme-specific exhibitions, projects in the public space and videos on issues such as global capitalism, forms of resistance, social alternatives, racism and genetic engineering. He will present his projects 100 Years of Greenhouse Effect and Sustainable Propaganda. www.ressler.at

Tamara Steger is director of the Centre for Environmental Policy and Law at CEU and a specialist in environmental justice and sustainable development. Her paper is entitled ‘Fin de Siecle to Stuckism:  Reclusiveness and Social Activism for Sustainability’.

Adam Sutherland is Director of Grizedale Arts where he has developed a wide ranging artist centred programme that incorporates the local cultures of the Lake District - historical, political and economic. www.grizedale.org

Yanina Taneva is Art For Social Change Programme Manager at The Red House - Center for culture and Debate, Sofia. Her paper is entitled: ‘Does Concrete Blossom? Environmentally-Conscious Art in Present-day Bulgaria as Political Statement’

Alan Watt is a lecturer in environmental philosophy and the development of environmental thought at the Department of Environmental Science and Policy at Central European University. He will speak on ‘Sustainability as a Political Ideal’.

For more details, see the symposium website: www.translocal.org/sustainability

Art in the Age of Global Warming

This lecture was given by Maja and Reuben Fowkes at the conference Europe Now, Europe Next organised by Culturebase.net and sought to bring a ecological dimension to the notion of ‘cultural versus national borders’ in Europe.

Issues around borders and memory have had a strong presence in contemporary art for a decade or more, especially in Eastern Europe, where identities of all kinds were put into question ‘after the Wall.’ We argue that a powerful set of concerns have recently come into play, changing how these issues are perceived and placing them in a new context. The need to face up to the implications of climate change is arguably as much of a challenge for contemporary art as it is for the car industry. The challenge of sustainability for art leads to the questioning of established institutions and practices, including art fairs and biennials, the craze for building new art museums, down to the ecological impact of the art work itself. Sustainability also opens up new possibilities for art to take a critical position towards the unsustainable aspects of contemporary society.

This paper explores the implications of sustainability for contemporary art and examines how the need to respond to the global ecological crisis is bringing about a reorientation of the most acute contemporary art, where virtual space is valued as a carbon-free zone, the border crossings of Europe rediscovered as an accidental wilderness, and popular memories and myths are treated as perishable elements of human experience that are endangered by the juggernaut of progress. Equally, just by being sustainable through their practice and preserving their autonomy from mainstream society, contemporary artists have the potential to create a space for radical thinking and to experiment with alternatives.

Sustainable Visions

Maja and Reuben Fowkes were invited by the organisers of the excellent Shifting Ground Conference in County Clare to curate a film screening dealing with issues of sustainability in a rural context.

Responding to the broad dilemma of ‘how to meet the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’ has implications for artistic practice both in terms of formal approach and subject matter. The transformation of society into a more sustainable one entails putting into practice the principles of ecology, grassroots democracy, social justice and non-violence.

Sustainable Visions presents films that deal with changes in rural economies, the position of the other in closed communities, the contemporary desire to reconnect with old knowledge, and the possibilities of non-violent artistic intervention in the rural environment. The programme will include Goran Dević’s Imported Crows (2004), Csaba Nemes’s Africa Day (2006), Beata Veszely’s On the Way to Heaven (2006), Ivan Ladislav Galeta’s Fire (2006) and Denis Krašković’s Strabat Mater (2006).

International Symposium on Sustainability and Contemporary Art

 

This gathering of artists, theorists and environmentalists at Central European University Budapest in March 2006 was the first occasion on which issues of sustainability and contemporary art were tackled in a collaborative, interdisciplinary and transnational context. A number of important future projects grew out of this successful event.

Sustainability has been at the top of the global environmental agenda for more than a decade, but an understanding of ecological responsibility is only now beginning to have a visible impact on society and culture. The symposium will explore the radical and innovatory power of the concept of sustainability, which implies a strategy for integrative development in harmony with nature and a reinvigorated notion of global justice on the basis of shared environmental responsibility.

Our intention is to create a transdisciplinary space for discussion of the fundamental issues bridging the fields of art and environment and an opportunity to be inspired by the response of leading international artists to the challenge of sustainability. Presentations will show how contemporary art might engage with the full implications of sustainability beyond visualising ecological disasters and illustrating environmental campaigns.

The innovative practices featured range from finding ways to foster cultural diversity, exploring new environmental notions such as sustainable pleasure, developing alternative concepts of wealth, and finding out new ecological uses of space. The role of the curator in engaging with environmental issues will also be examined, while aestheticians and environmentalists will offer theoretical perspectives on art and sustainability.

Speakers
Alexios Antypas (US)
Heath Bunting and Kayle Brandon (UK)
Cosmin Costinaş (RO)
Jonathan Dronsfield (UK)
Miklos Erhardt (H)
David Haley (UK)
Newton & Helen Mayer Harrison (USA)
Tamás Kaszás and Viktor Kotun (H)
Hildegard Kurt (GER)
Kristina Leko (CRO)
Edit Molnár (H)
Csaba Nemes (H)
Nils Norman (UK)
Marko Peljhan (SLO)
Renata Poljak (CRO)
Rúrí (IS)
Diane Warburton (UK)

Symposium on Sustainability and Contemporary Art

Delegates tuck in to rebel caterer Oran’s fabulous vegetarian lunch