Monthly Archives: September 2012

stagereads features Caridad Svich

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photo: stagereads, Fishing in the Gulf of Mexico

This post comes to you from Ashden Directory

Kellie Gutman writes:

A new website, stagereads, is publishing plays by emerging playwrights, which are e-readable on mobile devices. They are available by subscription, with a 155 discount for those subscribing before 15 September.  The first featured playwright is Caridad Svich and her recent play The Way of Water.

Svich received the 2012 OBIE Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre.  The Way of Water has been traveling since 3 April, 2012, and has had readings in fifty cities in the United States as well as in the UK and beyond.  The play, written after the Deepwater Horizon BP oil spill, tells the story of two fishermen in the Gulf of Mexico, who have to deal with the after effects of the spill. The introduction to the play is written by Henry Godinez, Resident Artistic Associate at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago.

He writes in his final paragraph:

Many a great play has been written about corporate negligence and devastating catastrophes, but what makes The Way of Water so compelling is the way it exposes the after effects of such sensational evens in the most real of human terms.

 

“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

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Extreme Weather

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This post comes to you from EcoArtScotland

Six years ago Professor John Schellnhuber (who had recently been appointed as Chief Government Adviser on Climate and Related Issues by the German Chancellor) talked at the RSA Art and Ecology Conference (2006) about the challenges in modelling the interactions between different critical points in global environmental systems – gulf streams, sea ice, glaciers and snow on mountains, desertification, etc.  He was addressing complexity, not looking at one thing in isolation.

The recent article, Extreme Weather, in the National Geographic explores the increasing extreme weather – flooding, storms, tornadoes, drought and fire.  The article offers an interesting analogy: climate change has a similar effect to steriods – you don’t know whether the steriods enable the batter to score this home run in particular, but you do know that they increase the overall likelihood of scoring more home runs than someone not on steriods.  So the point is not to ask whether climate change caused this storm or that heatwave, but rather to recognise that it is affecting frequency and intensity.

All analogies (and metaphors) have to be used carefully - steriods as a metaphor for ’enhancing’ and making more powerful is probably not the worst, but the other medicalised metaphor is ‘cancer’ which engenders a particular sort of fear – see Susan Sontag’s Illness as Metaphor.

We are still learning about complex adaptive systems.  Understanding that things are connected and that there are unintended consquences is only a small step along the road.

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

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Jonathan Jones faces the empty museum

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This post comes to you from Ashden Directory

Guardian art critic Jonathan Jones on the sixth extinction:
“Human activity endangers entire species, yet human culture is profoundly rooted in nature. The loss of a species is also a loss of the images, stories, symbols and wonders that we live by – to call it a cultural loss may sound too cerebral: what we lose when we lose animals is the very meaning of life…The range of animals and plants threatened by the sixth extinction is such that it menaces the foundations of culture as well as the diversity of nature. We are part of nature and it has always fed our imaginations. We face the bare walls of an empty museum, a gallery of the dead.”

 

“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

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Call for Proposals – SCORAI

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This post comes to you from Cultura21

The Sustainable Consumption Research and Action Initiative (SCORAI) is organizing an international conference on the theme of “The Future of Consumerism and Well-being in a World of Ecological Constraints” on June 12-14, 2013, at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts, USA. The conference seeks:

  1. To improve our understanding of the complex driving forces underlying prevalent consumerist lifestyles in the wealthy parts of the globe;
  2. To generate insights about fostering a necessary transition toward alternative ways of pursuing individual and societal well-being in a technological society cognizant of ecological limits;
  3. To build on recent developments to establish a vibrant global research community focused on sustainable consumption.

Proposals are invited for conference sessions, individual papers, and posters based on theoretical and applied research. Especially welcome are interdisciplinary contributions that address consumerism from different perspectives; alternative visions and framings of post-consumerism; and emergent contours of post-consumerist society.

Prospective participants are encouraged to visit http://www.scorai.org for more complete information,including details on the submission of session proposals and paper and poster abstracts. Information is also available on target dates, registration and fees, and accommodations.

The deadline for the submission of session proposals/paper and poster abstracts is October 1, 2012.

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

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Landscape Dissertation/Project Prizes

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This post comes to you from EcoArtScotland

Tim Collins highlighted that nominations are invited by the Landscape Research Group for PhD, Masters and Undergraduate dissertations and projects.

The deadline for submissions:

  • Undergraduate prizes is 15 September 2012,
  • MA and PhD prizes are both 15 November 2012.
  • Announcement will be made by 30 May 2013.

See below for further details:

Landscape Research Group is an interdisciplinary organisation the members of which include academics and practitioners from a range of disciplines including geography, landscape design, landscape architecture and planning. The Group publishes the scholarly journal Landscape Research. Part of the Group’s remit is to encourage innovative research on landscape related issues amongst students.

To this end we now have three Doctoral degree prizes, three prizes for Masters dissertations or projects and three prizes for undergraduate dissertations. The prizes are available to students who have completed a PhD, Masters degree or undergraduate degree and have produced a dissertation and/or project in a subject area with a landscape focus in the year Oct 2011 – Oct 2012.

We have also established a new online prize environment that asks course directors and research degree coordinators to register and nominate students online. If you are interested in doing so, please send me an email with your name, your academic title, as well as university address, email and phone number to awards@landscaperesearch.org. You will be enrolled on our system and able to nominate students directly. Once nominated students will receive an email with instruction to upload their thesis and supporting appendices to be considered for a prize. [http://www.landscaperesearch.org/student_section] .

Landscape Research Group Prizes

    • Up to three Doctoral Prizes at £500 for original contributions to knowledge
    • Up to three Masters Prizes at £350 for significant academic and creative inquiry
    • Up to three Undergraduate Prizes at £250 each for rigorous analysis and output

We make our prizes in a broad range of fields as befitting the landscape topic. We request that course leaders or doctoral programme coordinators make their nomination in one of three categories, also identifying the academic area (to the subject level) in your school that provided the academic setting and primary academic support for the degree.

Our categories include:

    • Humanities: Including cultural geography, history, archaeology, literature or philosophy.
    • Science, Planning and Management: material geography, environmental management, material geography, planning, and science.
    • Art and Design: architecture, art, design and landscape architecture.

For further information see the Landscape Research Group website.

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

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Artist Stacy Levy unveils “Straw Garden”

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This post comes to you from Green Public Art
Stacy Levy's Straw GardenAs a sculptor, Stacy Levy uses art as a vehicle for translating the patterns and processes of the natural world into the language of human understanding. Her projects are designed so that the site tells the ecological story of itself. Meshing the clarity of maps and diagrams, and the accessibility of science with the visceral sense of the site, Levy tries to create an instant wonder and understanding for the viewer.

Straw Garden is a six month project at the Seattle Center in Seattle, WA. The piece is made of erosion control wattles, in the shape of a baroque garden that spools out into a watershed form; all planted in native species of perennials and shrubs. At the end of the exhibition and the growing season, the garden will be divided and delivered to other landscapes in need of restoration and erosion control.

Straw Garden uses modern landscape restoration materials in a baroque garden configuration. The symmetrical parterre are based on Le Notre’s design for Versailles. The straw wattles are most commonly used for sedimentation control while the coir (coconut fiber) wattles are used for erosion control, on slopes and stream banks. The baroque garden relied on two views, from within the garden and from high above in the manor house. This new garden also has multiple vantages: the lawn, and the elevated views from the monorail and space needle. This temporary work will have a second life as a plant source for landscapes that need restoration and native plant diversity. In several years the wattles will biodegrade, while the native perennials continue to take root and thrive.

Straw Garden is part of The Next Fifty Seattle Center 2012, celebrating the 50th anniversary of the 1962 Seattle World’s Fair, exploring critical issues affecting the Pacific Northwest and the world, and creating synergies that inspire a shared future vision.

Rebecca Ansert, founder of Green Public Art, is an art consultant who specializes in artist solicitation, artist selection, and public art project management for both private and public agencies. She is a graduate of the master’s degree program in Public Art Studies at the University of Southern California and has a unique interest in how art can demonstrate green processes or utilize green design theories and techniques in LEED certified buildings.

Green Public Art is a Los Angeles-based consultancy that was founded in 2009 in an effort to advance the conversation of public art’s role in green building. The consultancy specializes in public art project development and management, artist solicitation and selection, creative community involvement and knowledge of LEED building requirements. Green Public Art also works with emerging and mid-career studio artists to demystify the public art process. The consultancy acts as a resource for artists to receive one-on-one consultation before, during, and after applying for a public art project.
Go to Green Public Art

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Borders Network: Creative Environments

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This post comes to you from Cultura21

This blog was created recently, with support of the Creative Arts Business Network to support an informal network for artists, designers, makers in the Scottish Borders concerned with ecology, environment and sustainability; sharing their upcoming and ongoing projects with other people interested in sustainability and eco-art.

For more information, you can visit:

http://ecoartborders.wordpress.com/

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

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CultureLab: Bio-artists who tinker with tools of science

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This post comes to you from EcoArtScotland

The New Scientist’s CultureLab blog ran a story, Bio-artists who tinker with tools of science, in early August on artists working with “the tools of science.”  The article draws in particular on the work of SymbioticA.  It doesn’t talk about Critical Art Ensemble or Eduardo Kac, but it does acknowledge the multiple possible outcomes of art working with science (and those tools).

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

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Trybooking | Greening Our Performance – Production

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Join us for the fourth workshop in the 2012 Greening Our Performance series as we tackle sustainable production. How do we incorporate sustainability into production? Is it possible to assess our carbon footprint and what is Green Design?

Facilitated by Angharad Wynne-Jones (Tipping Point Australia and Artshouse), this sessions will involve a number of practical presentations and panel discussions by some of the industry’s leading sustainable practitioners.

Afternoon tea will be provided and we invite you to join us for post event drinks at the Curve Bar afterwards.

DATE:  Friday 7th September.
TIME:  1pm to 5pm
VENUE: ANZ Pavillion, Arts Centre Melbourne, VIC.
CONTACT DETAILS: Angela Pamic. angelapamic@gmail.com

via Trybooking | Greening Our Performance – Production.

Keep up with Greening Our Performance on Facebook

PLATFORM is hiring

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This post comes to you from EcoArtScotland

From the PLATFORM newsletter:

We’re looking to hire not one, but two positions. Please share this info with anyone who you think might be interested and help us find some really great people!

The deadline for both sets of applicants is 6.00pm Friday the 14th September.

Coordinator for ‘Shake! Young Voices in Arts, Media, Race & Power’ Driving our three-year cultural activism programme with young people (16-25 years old) tackling social and environmental injustice from a race perspective. Shake! will develop a new generation of cultural activists. The new post will co-ordinate with a team of artist-facilitators, campaigners, young people and partner organisations, and oversee dissemination of Shake’s work to a wider public. More info here.

Oil & Human Rights Campaigner Investigating and challenging the environmental and human rights abuses carried out by oil companies in the Niger Delta. Supporting social movements and activists in Nigeria in exposing and holding those responsible to account. Challenging British military and diplomatic support for oil-driven militarisation. More info here.

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

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