Monthly Archives: December 2011

Call for Papers: Beyond the Creative City

This post comes to you from Cultura21

Special Issue: Beyond the Creative City
Portugal

The “Cities, Cultures, and Architecture Research Group” of the Centre for Social Studies (CES), University of Coimbra is going to publish a special journal issue called “Beyond the Creative City” in December 2012. Therefore it calls for papers on the topic of urban development and its effect on local cultures and heritage. Creative city investments and initiatives play an important role in this field, but they get into the focus of heavy critique. Thus the editors search for alternative approaches to urban futures, with a sustainable environment, society and economy and attention payed to inclusion and social equity, to make it short: approaches with a higher cultural sensivity.

The call for papers is not only directed to architects and cultural politicians, but also aims at researchers from the fields of sociology,  anthropology, arts, cultural studies, as well as other disciplines confronted with urban space. Possible topics for investigation are:

urban lifestyles and means of resistance, socioeconomic conditions and empowerment of residents through artistic/cultural initiatives, the impacts of tourism and ‘creative city’ initiatives on cities over the last decade, affirmations of cultural expressions, and the democratic governance of cities.
Revista Crítica de Ciências Sociais (RCCS) publishes the results of advanced research in all fields of social and human sciences in four issues per year. As Revista Crítica de Ciências Sociais is a peer-reviewed journal, all submitted works are graded by three reviewers, and ranked in terms of quality for this special issue. 6-8 articles will be chosen for publication as well as  4-5 book reviews.

The submission deadline for articles is 31 March 2012. Articles can be sent in Portuguese, English, French and Spanish to the following email address: rccs [at] ces [dot] uc [dot] pt

For more information please visit: http://www.ces.uc.pt/rccs/index.php or download the Call for Papers as PDF file here: CFP Beyond the Creative City

Cultura21 is a transversal, translocal network, constituted of an international level grounded in several Cultura21 organizations around the world.

Cultura21′s international network, launched in April 2007, offers the online and offline platform for exchanges and mutual learning among its members.

The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:

– Sacha Kagan (based in Lüneburg, Germany) and Rana Öztürk (based in Berlin, Germany)
– Oleg Koefoed and Kajsa Paludan (both based in Copenhagen, Denmark)
– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
– Francesca Cozzolino and David Knaute (both based in Paris, France)

Cultura21 is not only an informal network. Its strength and vitality relies upon the activities of several organizations around the world which are sharing the vision and mission of Cultura21

Go to Cultura21

Lillian Ball: Waterwash ABC

This post comes to you from Cultura21

Lillian Ball works in New York as an environmental artist and activist. She has a multidisciplinary background in anthropology, ethnographic film, and sculpture, which influences her work. Furthermore she has received numerous awards and has traveled widely due to her international exhibitions.

Her latest project Waterwash ABC includes the construction of a wetland park, improvement of habitat as well as increase of public access to Bronx River. Its aim is to filter storm runoff and create consciousness among the community for watershed issues by means of an aesthetic nature experience.  The need for restoration and revitalization of areas challenged by stormwater issues is widespread in waterfront areas worldwide.

The vision of Lilian Ball was a vegetated swale with native plants, permeable pavement, and educational signage explaining the need for non-point source stormwater management in private as well as public places.  The transformation of a neglected space into a public outreach park is supposed to inspire community commitment to stormwater issues.

The runoff from the parking lot and the roof of the ABC Carpet and Home retail facility at 1055 Bronx River Ave was emptied unfiltered into the Bronx River. Ball’s project aims to alter this fact. Rocking the Boat is the fiscal agent for this Bronx River Watershed Initiative in order to construct a wetland habitat that stabilizes the shoreline to detain and filter the outfalls before they enter the river.

Rocking the Boat students will plant a variety of salt-tolerant native species and help the  ABC personnel in planting the community vegetable garden and maintain the site. Above that a hydrologic monitoring will be carried out by Rocking the Boat environmental apprentices.

In that way the project creates a permanent, publicly visible remediation, habitat restoration, and educational site. Above that it acts as a green infrastructure model.
For more information see http://lillianball.com/waterwash/index.html and  www.rockingtheboat.org

Cultura21 is a transversal, translocal network, constituted of an international level grounded in several Cultura21 organizations around the world.

Cultura21′s international network, launched in April 2007, offers the online and offline platform for exchanges and mutual learning among its members.

The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:

– Sacha Kagan (based in Lüneburg, Germany) and Rana Öztürk (based in Berlin, Germany)
– Oleg Koefoed and Kajsa Paludan (both based in Copenhagen, Denmark)
– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
– Francesca Cozzolino and David Knaute (both based in Paris, France)

Cultura21 is not only an informal network. Its strength and vitality relies upon the activities of several organizations around the world which are sharing the vision and mission of Cultura21

Go to Cultura21

Call for Papers: CONTEMP ART ’12

This post comes to you from Cultura21

From the 11th to 14th of April 2012 the Contemporary Art Conference takes place in Istanbul, Turkey. It is open to the approaches of institutions and history of contemporary art as well as to styles generated by various international artists with different tendencies. Contemporary art has contrary characteristics and constantly renews itself and its environment whether from new materials or ways of communicating with the audience. It gets into the focus of criticism, too.

“Contemporary art, with all its wrapped dimensions, confronts us every day with new agenda and disputes.”

The Contemp Art ’12 tries to give answers to the questions that appear in the rise of the new millennium given this complex motion. Artists as well as institutions are welcomed to follow the call for papers. There are different suggestions on themes, a very interesting one for ecological art is the tendency of place, city and nature as well as material and environment.

The event will be arranged by the Eastern Mediterranean Academic Research Center.

Enquiries: info [at] contempartconference [dot] org
Web address: http://contempartconference.org

Cultura21 is a transversal, translocal network, constituted of an international level grounded in several Cultura21 organizations around the world.

Cultura21′s international network, launched in April 2007, offers the online and offline platform for exchanges and mutual learning among its members.

The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:

– Sacha Kagan (based in Lüneburg, Germany) and Rana Öztürk (based in Berlin, Germany)
– Oleg Koefoed and Kajsa Paludan (both based in Copenhagen, Denmark)
– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
– Francesca Cozzolino and David Knaute (both based in Paris, France)

Cultura21 is not only an informal network. Its strength and vitality relies upon the activities of several organizations around the world which are sharing the vision and mission of Cultura21

Go to Cultura21

New metaphors for sustainability: the surprises

This post comes to you from Ashden Directory

Wallace Heim writes:

When we’ve asked people to think of a metaphor, we tried to present the idea of ‘sustainability’ in neither a positive nor a negative light, but to leave it as open as possible for people to interpret it in their own way. Even for the DVD, we filmed the four people without knowing ahead of time what their metaphors would be. We didn’t want to promote any one idea of sustainability.

It’s been surprising how positive the metaphors have been, even from those people for whom sustainability is not a strong idea, or from those who acknowledge its ambiguities.

It’s also been surprising to see how people have found something, maybe not the grand conceptual metaphor, but something in their lives that relates to their view of sustainability. This is as important as the encapsulating metaphor, like the ‘iron curtain’ or the ‘glass ceiling’. The metaphors have not been about a concept imposed from the outside, but about a relation between the idea and something from one’s life that makes sense.

We’ll be presenting more metaphors in the next two weeks.

 

“ashdenizen blog and twitter are consistently among the best sources for information and reflection on developments in the field of arts and climate change in the UK” (2020 Network)

ashdenizen is edited by Robert Butler, and is the blog associated with the Ashden Directory, a website focusing on environment and performance.
The Ashden Directory is edited by Robert Butler and Wallace Heim, with associate editor Kellie Gutman. The Directory includes features, interviews, news, a timeline and a database of ecologically – themed productions since 1893 in the United Kingdom. Our own projects include ‘New Metaphors for Sustainability’, ‘Flowers Onstage’ and ‘Six ways to look at climate change and theatre’.

The Directory has been live since 2000.

Go to The Ashden Directory

New metaphors for sustainability: the Spanish Dehesa

This post comes to you from Ashden Directory

Our series on new metaphors for sustainability continues with Alison Turnbull‘s ‘Spanish Dehesa’, a sylvopastoral system that marries production and nature conservation.  Alison was born in Bogotà, lives in London and exhibits her artwork there.  

I first saw the Spanish dehesaon a trip to Extremadura some twenty years ago. We drove for over fifty miles without passing another car and the temperature soared to 53º C. It was difficult to believe we were in Western Europe and not in the plains of the American west or crossing an African savannah.  I’ve been back every year since, walking and experiencing this unique eco-system in all kinds of weather, under all sorts of light.

Rather like the evocative Spanish term duende, used in the performing arts to mean ‘soul’ or ‘spirit’, dehesa is a difficult word to translate. Meadow, wooded pastureland and grazing operation, it is a sylvo-pastoral system that covers 20,000 square kilometres, mostly in southwest Spain but also stretching into Portugal and Morocco. It is one of the oldest created landscapes in Europe – a cultural landscape if you like – just how ancient no one quite knows, but certainly several centuries, and it remains an outstanding example of intelligent husbandry.  It is beneficial to the needs of human beings but also hospitable to a whole variety of other creatures, including many rare butterflies.

The grassed zones in between the oak trees are famously home to acorn-fed Iberian pigs that produce the most wonderful ham in the world. Honey, cheese, cork and charcoal are all products of the dehesa. It is an area of exceptional bio-diversity – for instance it is the wintering ground for most of Europe’s population of Grus grus, the common crane.

The dehesais special in that it is an area where maximum exploitation sits side by side with maximum conservation. It’s man-made and it’s right here in Europe.

“ashdenizen blog and twitter are consistently among the best sources for information and reflection on developments in the field of arts and climate change in the UK” (2020 Network)

ashdenizen is edited by Robert Butler, and is the blog associated with the Ashden Directory, a website focusing on environment and performance.
The Ashden Directory is edited by Robert Butler and Wallace Heim, with associate editor Kellie Gutman. The Directory includes features, interviews, news, a timeline and a database of ecologically – themed productions since 1893 in the United Kingdom. Our own projects include ‘New Metaphors for Sustainability’, ‘Flowers Onstage’ and ‘Six ways to look at climate change and theatre’.

The Directory has been live since 2000.

Go to The Ashden Directory

US town to turn drainage basin into public art

This post comes to you from EcoArtScotland

image from Jackie Brookner's page on the Women Environmental Artists Directory

Minnesota Public Radio recently reported that Jackie Brookner is advising and supporting the inhabitants of the City of Fargo in North Dakota on a major ecological art project funded in part by the National Endowment for the Arts.  The focus of the project is making use of a drainage basin, built to deal with heavy summer rains, as year round facilities for the community.

There’s an interview with Brookner on the NEA blog and if you prefer listening to reading, you can hear her on the Social Practices Art Network.

image from Heart of Reeds website

In the UK Chris Drury’s Heart of Reeds in Lewes, West Sussex, is probably a comparable project.  This constructed environment remediates industrial pollution whilst providing recreational space and managing rain water.

ecoartscotland is a resource focused on art and ecology for artists, curators, critics, commissioners as well as scientists and policy makers. It includes ecoartscotland papers, a mix of discussions of works by artists and critical theoretical texts, and serves as a curatorial platform.

It has been established by Chris Fremantle, producer and research associate with On The Edge Research, Gray’s School of Art, The Robert Gordon University. Fremantle is a member of a number of international networks of artists, curators and others focused on art and ecology.
Go to EcoArtScotland

New metaphors for sustainability: a stranger’s compass

This post comes to you from Ashden Directory

Our co-editor Wallace Heim continues our series of new metaphors for sustainability with a guidance system that changes hands. 

Walking an unfamiliar Cumbrian fell with a compass, often without a map, links me to the land in a special way. The invisible, magnetic north that spins into place on the device is often perplexing and counter-intuitive. However reassuring it is to know there are vast forces of geology beyond any I can see, forces that co-ordinate my safe passage, I still have to negotiate the land right in front of me: that granite face, that swamped mire, that fast river. There is no picture in which to find myself, only wit, the land and the pull of a distant polar force.

A few times, I’ve come across a dropped compass. There’s a moment when clearing the mud from its face when I wonder whether it was left behind because it was broken, or not believed. Is the north that was found in a stranger’s hand the same as in mine?

I don’t think sustainability can be likened directly to a compass, as if there was a pole of certainty to it. There are orientations that guide, but they fluctuate with a landscape that is continually shifting. The incremental decisions made in response to immediate conditions themselves change the situation, alter what is possible to do. I see sustainability as a response to change, one that keeps alive the capacity to respond to further change. What kind of compass would show this light-footed improvisation that makes sure those in the future can navigate their own way?

Walking with a stranger’s compass comes closer as a metaphor. The compass is given, handed over, and it connects me to those I will never know, while helping me cross the land that I am in. The instruction is not reliable; maybe not safe. Or maybe it is, and the coordinates are sharper than on my own compass, signalling a clearer route. Is it pulling me in a direction I couldn’t have imagined? This uncertain magnetism invigorates the walk. One day, I’ll leave my compass behind.

“ashdenizen blog and twitter are consistently among the best sources for information and reflection on developments in the field of arts and climate change in the UK” (2020 Network)

ashdenizen is edited by Robert Butler, and is the blog associated with the Ashden Directory, a website focusing on environment and performance.
The Ashden Directory is edited by Robert Butler and Wallace Heim, with associate editor Kellie Gutman. The Directory includes features, interviews, news, a timeline and a database of ecologically – themed productions since 1893 in the United Kingdom. Our own projects include ‘New Metaphors for Sustainability’, ‘Flowers Onstage’ and ‘Six ways to look at climate change and theatre’.

The Directory has been live since 2000.

Go to The Ashden Directory

Anthroposcene

This post comes to you from EcoArtScotland

Prof Tim Collins and I presented Anthropo-scene Evolution at AHM’s State of Play symposium in Dundee at the beginning of October.  The article The age of man is not a disaster  in the NYTimes sets the scene for the arguments around the new terminology of anthroposcene.

ecoartscotland is a resource focused on art and ecology for artists, curators, critics, commissioners as well as scientists and policy makers. It includes ecoartscotland papers, a mix of discussions of works by artists and critical theoretical texts, and serves as a curatorial platform.

It has been established by Chris Fremantle, producer and research associate with On The Edge Research, Gray’s School of Art, The Robert Gordon University. Fremantle is a member of a number of international networks of artists, curators and others focused on art and ecology.
Go to EcoArtScotland

Feeding the 5000! – Trafalgar Square 18 November

A free lunch was served to over 5,000 people in Trafalgar Square. All the ingredients used for the lunch are fresh and would otherwise be wasted – wonky carrots, mis-shapen potatoes and other fresh surplus produce.

There were live cooking demonstrations and plenty of other activities to get stuck into, all of which involved enjoying delicious food rather than throwing it away. Feeding the 5,000 invited citizens and businesses to all join in a pledge to reduce food waste. For more information please check this website http://www.feeding5k.org , or you can find it on facebook (http://www.facebook.com/pages/Feeding5k/141410032625501) and Twitter (Twitter @Feeding5k).

Go to Arcola Energy