Anthropocene

ANTHROPOCENE CAMPUS

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This post comes to you from Cultura21
unnamedNov. 14-22, 2014
Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin
Call for Applications
Deadline: May 7, 2014
For doctoral students, post-docs, and actors from the arts, culture, politics, and society with a research orientation
More information<
Online application form

With the ANTHROPOCENE PROJECT, HKW seeks to strengthen transdisciplinary debates and studies on the multifarious implications of the Anthropocene hypothesis for cultures of knowledge. If humankind has actually become the dominant biogeophysical force effecting changes on planetary scale, how can the arts, sciences and humanities contribute to a critical awareness, understanding and responsible co-shaping of these transformations?

The collaboratively produced ANTHROPOCENE CURRICULUM takes up these challenges posed by the Anthropocene Age: since fall 2013, 27 international university teachers from the sciences, environmental studies, the humanities, and social sciences, art, and architecture have discussed new teaching content, approaches, and methods.

Together with the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin and other renowned partners, Haus der Kulturen der Welt has developed an ANTHROPOCENE CURRICULUM that seeks to explore paths for a crossdisciplinary culture of knowledge and education in an experimental and exemplary way. How can we compile a body of “earthbound knowledge,” what forms of transmission are appropriate?

An exemplary model course will for the first time be implemented and put into teaching practice at the temporary ANTHROPOCENE CAMPUS from November 14-22, 2014.

100 international doctoral students and post-docs along with actors working in the fields of arts, culture, politics, and society can contribute their perspectives and expertise. The ANTHROPOCENE CAMPUS offers a transdisciplinary platform for participants from a wide range of disciplinary backgrounds, academic and professional contexts. One important result of the intense encounters and events at the campus will be a coursebook. The online platform anthropocene-curriculum.org will offer all project participants and initiators a long-term context for discussion.

Until May 7, 2014 doctoral students and post-docs from the natural sciences, humanities, social sciences, engineering, design, and art and research-oriented actors from the arts, culture, politics, and societyes (think-tanks, NGOs, etc.) can apply to participate in the campus.

This post is also available in: German

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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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Osomocene

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This post comes to you from Chantal Bilodeau’s Artists and Climate Change Blog

By guest contributors Seth Baum and Inés Garcia

Greetings. We are Seth Baum and Inés Garcia. We are a scientist and an artist. And we both care about climate change. Seth cares about climate change because of the threat it poses to humanity, to other happy living things, and to their future in the universe. Inés cares about climate change because it affects every person and living being on the planet and we, as a civilization, are far too intelligent to continue contributing to the destruction of the endless resources on this planet.

We made Osomocene Productions because we believe that humanity can make a world that has a healthy environment and is still enjoyable for us humans. Indeed, we coined the word Osomocene to mean the Age of Awesome – awesome for humans and awesome for the environment. We intend the Osomocene as the successor to the current era, the Anthropocene, which is defined by human disruption of the environment. With Osomocene Productions, we want to envision this age of awesome and communicate the vision to other people so that together we can make the vision a reality.

Osomocene Productions articulates its vision for a better world through short-form online videos. Short form videos are fun and easy to watch, and they offer us the chance to talk about a variety of subjects. By putting them online, anyone can watch them, and who knows, they may even ‘go viral’ and get seen by many. (Click here to share our videos!) But most importantly, short-form videos let us create everyday scenarios that depict positive ways to help with climate change that everyone can take part in.

Our collaboration brings together Seth’s research and Ines’s artistry. Seth’s research covers two important areas. First is the science of climate change, and in particular the science of what people can do to help with climate change. Second is the science of communication, and the psychology of how communication can translate into action. Ines’s artistic sense for aesthetic quality helps us identify key themes from the research and convert them, through dramatic interpretation, into compelling story and character. Ines also manages the logistics of how to produce a film, coordinating with actors, directors, editors, and crew.

So far, we have produced one video (titled Vegetarian Cookbook) and have a second video scheduled for filming in April. Many more ideas are in the works. These videos have given us the chance to explore and refine our artistic and collaborative styles. Working together has been a tremendous growth process for both of us. We’re constantly trying out new ideas in our ongoing effort to promote a better world.

Filed under: Featured Artist, Multimedia, Video

Artists and Climate Change is a blog by playwright Chantal Bilodeau that tracks artistic responses from all disciplines to the problem of climate change. It is both a study about what is being done, and a resource for anyone interested in the subject. Art has the power to reframe the conversation about our environmental crisis so it is inclusive, constructive, and conducive to action. Art can, and should, shape our values and behavior so we are better equipped to face the formidable challenge in front of us.

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New metaphors for sustainability: coral reef

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This post comes to you from Ashden Directory

Caspar Henderson, writer and journalist, suggests coral reef, its efficiency, vulnerability and beauty, as a metaphor for sustainability. Caspar’s Book of Barely Imagined Beings: A Bestiary for the Anthropocene will be published by Granta in 2012.

As many people know, healthy tropical coral reef are among the the richest, most diverse and productive ecosystems on the planet, rivaled perhaps only by rainforests. It’s less widely appreciated, however, that this astonishing exuberance thrives in water that is very low in nutrients. The secret of the reef is that nutrients and materials are reused and recycled with great efficiency and rapidity in an almost closed loop.

Driving the cycle is sunlight, which is of course abundant in the tropics. Corals polyps, which are tiny animals, are able to build their layering and branching and skeletons (and thus over time the entire reef on which so much else depends) thanks to a partnership with photosynthetic algae called zooxanthellae, which harness energy from the sun and ‘feed’ their coral hosts in return for lodging.  Whether or not you believe in the claims made for next generation nuclear power (and, like Amory Lovins and others, I have doubts), an economy that is able to run on energy directly harvested from the sun, store it where necessary and turn almost 100% of its wastes into assets looks like a good way to go.

Another familiar fact about coral reefs is that they are among the ecosystems in the world most vulnerable to human meddling. Our assaults come in various forms including direct ones such as destructive fishing practices and nutrient overload from sewage and agricultural runoff, and indirect ones such as rising global temperatures and ocean acidification caused by a rate of change in greenhouse gas concentrations not seen in millions of years.

Coral reefs can, we now know, thrive within certain boundaries, and be remarkably resilient to some shocks so long as the boundaries are not crossed. Once they are, however, the whole system can very quickly tip over into a degraded state. The reef becomes choked with slime and the food web disintegrates into a rotting boneyard that supports a dwindling band of scavengers. Previous perturbations to the Earth system comparable to current human activity have resulted in mass extinction events from which it has taken reefs millions of years to recover. We’re not talking about a metaphor here so much as a 400lb gorilla already standing on our toes.

The good news, in a far as there is any, is that we have a pretty good feel for what must be done if the threats to reefs are to be sharply reduced. Some of the most important measures such as stabilization and then reduction in atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations may look unachievable in the near term, but while we continue to struggle with those there are many other things that will also be necessary and on which progress can (and is) being made now. One such is the creation, with local community involvement, of networks of Marine Protected Areas.

A final, and for me the most important point about coral reefs is that they are places of stupendous beauty and wonder. Chances are these are not qualities that spring to mind when you think of sustainability. A more likely association might be something like ‘sensible shoes.‘

But sustainability does not have to be boring. It can and must be highly dynamic, just as a coral reef is: an arena for competition and struggle, yes, but an arena with  limits and where new kinds of flourishing and cooperation are forever unfolding. Cruelty, suffering and death are not eliminated, but the scope for doing your own thing or doing something new – whether it be to bake cakes with five year olds, develop greener energy technology, or dance flamenco while dressed as a flamboyant cuttlefish – is greatly increased.

photo:  Gray Hardel/Corbis

 

“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)

The editors are Robert Butler and Wallace Heim. The associate editor is Kellie Gutman. The editorial adviser is Patricia Morison.

Robert Butler’s most recent publication is The Alchemist Exposed (Oberon 2006). From 1995-2000 he was drama critic of the Independent on Sunday. See www.robertbutler.info

Wallace Heim has written on social practice art and the work of PLATFORM, Basia Irland and Shelley Sacks. Her doctorate in philosophy investigated nature and performance. Her previous career was as a set designer for theatre and television/film.

Kellie Gutman worked with the Aga Khan Trust for Culture for twenty years, producing video programmes and slide presentations for both the Aga Khan Foundation and the Award for Architecture.

Patricia Morison is an executive officer of the Sainsbury Family Charitable Trusts, a group of grant-making trusts of which the Ashden Trust is one.

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