Eco-artists in the Concrete Jungle
A dialogue between artist & researcher Brandon Ballengée and curator and co-director of Ecoartspace.org Amy Lipton
Bob Braine, Bronx Lot Florilegium chicorium, 2005, Wave Hill, New York City.
BB: In Fritjof Capra’s book The Hidden Connections, genes, cells, the entire body works through complex networks all connected with the environment. For that matter science, art, society nothing exists in a vacuum everything is linked in an encompassing series of systems with self-sustaining feedback loops. I think many Eco-artists today are engaging these ideas working towards a new paradigm that views art as participatory in society and the overall global environment. As human populations increase, epi-urbanized areas such as New York City, will continue to expand. Within these urban communities, non-human life is present too and needs to be addressed. Nature in these concrete jungles has traditionally been dismissed and often exterminated. Within the environmental community many groups such as the new Nurture New York’s Nature are working to increase public awareness and protect urban species and ecosystems. There is a history of Eco-artists working in urban areas.
‘in science, art, society nothing exists in a vacuum everything is linked in an encompassing series of systems with self-sustaining feedback loops
AL: For example, Alan Sonfist’s Time Landscape was initiated conceptually in 1965, and realized in lower Manhattan in 1978. It is an active work and continues today having been adopted in 1998 as an official NYC Parks Department site. Historically this work emerged out of the Earth/Land Art movement, however Time Landscape can be thought of as the first urban Earthwork of its generation. The goal of Time Landscape as artwork was to demonstrate the idea of bringing nature back into the urban environment and of creating a dialogue between natural and human history. This in contrast with ideas of other artists in the first generation Earth/Land Art movement who focused on taking art out of the city and locating it in remote areas. Time Landscape functions literally as an “ecovention” in the Greenwich Village. It was instrumental in blocking a plan by the NYC department of transportation to put a highway through the Village. Time Landscape was originally conceived as a model for a network of parks to spread out across the city to uncover the diverse natural and human history of the New York Metropolitan area.
Jackie Brookner, The Gift of Water Grossenhain, Germany, 3 x 5 x 9’, 2001
BB: The alternative trajectory to this movement comes from activist and socio-political work of the 1960’s. Artists intervene to instigate social, political, and environmental change. In the 1970’s Joseph Beuys coined the term “Social Sculpture” in which the artist sculpts society to instigate change in the real word. Beuys planted trees, increased awareness of sensitive ecosystems, and organized political gatherings in the name of art. Performance artist Suzanne Lacy regularly works with communities and students. One project involved working with students to create site-specific projects in places such as, an AIDS shelter, a drug rehabilitation center, and a recycling centre.
Susan Leibovitz Steinman creates community gardens in urban areas with the public and students. These team projects allow the participants to beautify their neighbourhoods while simultaneously creating a habitat for urban species and increasing the environmental quality of their regions. Creating and restoring habitats in urban communities is a big issue many Eco-artists are addressing.
As human populations increase, epi-urbanized areas such as New York City, will continue to expand. Within these urban communities, non-human life is present too and needs to be addressed
AL: Patricia Johansson is one of the first artists tackling urban habitats with drawings dating back as early as 1969. She continues to work at the forefront of issues on urban biodiversity with ecological art projects taking place in locations around the world. In 1981 Johansson came up with an experimental design for restoring Fair Park Lagoon in Dallas, TX. Her proposal was both practical as well as aesthetic, she wanted to re-mediate and reshape a functioning though out-of-balance aquatic community using ecological and sculptural ideas. Her plan helped to eliminate the over-population of algae through planting native vegetation at selected places to serve as a buffer between water and shore and she provided several aquatic species to help restore the ecosystem. Fair Park Lagoon was the first of many sculptural restoration projects that Johansson hs carried out for urban locations from San Francisco Bay to Seoul, Korea.
Alexis Rockman, Central Park, 2000, 48 x80”, olio e acrilico su legno oil and acrylic on wood
BB: These pieces work in biospheric terms as well as helping revitalize neighbourhoods. I think another element of these works involves reawakening people to what they already ahve their backyards. In their book Concrete Jungle Bob Braine, Mark Dion, and Alexis Rockman talk a lot about the species we share our cities with. Humans and many other organisms are evolving into city species. The urban ecology movement has worked hard to maintain essential habitats and study plants and animals within the city. Much of my own practise involves primary research of species conducted with students and the public through performative field-trips or Eco-actions.
In New York City we have 300+ species of birds, many of which migrate through from the Amazon and even as far as Greenland. They germinate plants in tropical rainforests and nest in artic zones yet live part of their life in NYC! There are comparisons to migratory fish that following the Gulf Stream north to swim up the Hudson River to spawn. It is hard for most urbanites to comprehend that their city is connected to a larger global environment. Yet we and our modified landscape are connected to everything else. I think artists may be able to illuminate this idea in ways that science alone cannot. In some of their conceptual works Helen and Newton Harrison have planned to “green”‚ urban areas, which would increase biodiversity and public understanding.
AL: Yes, it is interesting to look historically at artists’ work in relationship to urban issues and ecology. Well-known figures such as Agnes Denes and her pioneering work in 1982 Wheatfield: A Confrontation are still relevant today as early examples of urban greening. Denes planted 2 acres of wheat in Battery Park Landfill, which was then harvested and donated to the NYC police department horse stables. Also Mierle Laderman Ukeles who has spent the past two decades working with the NYC Dept of Sanitation and has participated on projects with sanitation workers to encourage public awareness about the urban waste stream and recycling. She is currently working with architects and engineers on the reclamation of Staten Islands Fresh Kills landfill, the largest of its kind in the world.
Buster Simpson, Vertical Landscape/ Downspout, Mixed media, 1999, Seattle, Washington
Today younger artists such as yourself and some of those artists you mention above have learned from and been inspired by these landmark projects. They are continuing the dialogue as the issues become ever more challenging and prominent. There are now artists working on virtually every environmental problem we face.
Aside from urban habitat issues, Alexis Rockman has been focusing on climate change, Peter Fend / Ocean Earth has been working for many years on alternative and renewable energy issues such as bio-mass and algae harvesting from the oceans, Jackie Brookner creates bio-sculptures that filter and purify water systems and has developed both working models as well as actual effective projects for this purpose as has Buster Simpson and Laurie Lundquist. German based artist Georg Dietzler has been working with oyster mushrooms, which he has used to decontaminate PCBs in soil and to decompose waste. Superflex, a Danish based artist team, have also worked on various projects world-wide confronting issues of globalization and renewable energy.
These projects are just a few worth mentioning, but the field is quickly growing and holds tremendous promise. The enormity of environmental issues we are facing in the 21st Century is daunting and it is encouraging to see artists taking on the challenges. Perhaps artists with their imaginative and less restricted approaches to problem solving will prove to be the visionaries that are so desperately needed in this time.
