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| Anne Percoco, Indra's Cloud, PET bottles (Yamuna River, India) 2008 |
“We stand at a critical moment in Earth's history, a time when humanity must choose its future. As the world becomes increasingly interdependent and fragile, the future at once holds great peril and great promise. To move forward we must recognize that in the midst of a magnificent diversity of cultures and life forms we are one human family and one Earth community with a common destiny. We must join together to bring forth a sustainable global society founded on respect for nature, universal human rights, economic justice, and a culture of peace. Towards this end, it is imperative that we, the peoples of Earth, declare our responsibility to one another, to the greater community of life, and to future generations.”
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| Yamuna River, India |
Thus, the use of the expression "sustainable art" means the inclusion of the artists' community in the global movement of professionals who are striving in the quest for solutions to environmental problems that affect us all, that is, by nurturing sustainable practices.
The concept of sustainability results from the recognition that humanity is changing the planetary systems due to its inability to fit it's activities into our planet's pattern of clouds, oceans, greenery, and soils, and that many such changes are accompanied by life-threatening hazards. (3)
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| Th highly poluted banks of the Yamuna River behind the Taj Mahal, India |
Sustainability requires that we all see the world as a system—a system that connects space; and a system that connects time. When we think of the world as a system over space, we grow to understand that air pollution from North America affects air quality in Asia, and that pesticides sprayed in Argentina could harm fish stocks off the coast of Australia.
In addition, when we think of the world as a system over time, we start to realize that the decisions our grandparents made about how to farm the land continue to affect agricultural practice today; and the economic policies we endorse today will have an impact on urban poverty when our children are adults.
It is also understood that quality of life is a system, too. It's good to be physically healthy, but what if you are poor and don't have access to education? It's good to have a secure income, but what if the air in your part of the world is unclean? And it's good to have freedom of religious expression, but what if you can't feed your family?
The concept of sustainability is rooted in this sort of systems thinking. It helps us understand ourselves and our world. The problems we face are complex and serious—and we can't address them in the same way we created them. But how to address them?
Addressing the ever increasing need for sustainability, sustainable art is produced in harmony with the regenerative ability of the planet’s ecosystems. It describes an artistic process that is immersed with the need for the long-term commitment and maintenance of responsibility for the environment as a whole unit (living and no-living elements) and made of different parts that are intrinsically interconnected and interdependent, regardless any apparent distance between them.
Thus, sustainable art shows a commitment to the long-term maintenance of responsibility towards all ecosystems, which means that it is concerned with the economic, and social dimensions of the art work itself, and carries, within its creative process, key principles of sustainability such as:
1) environmental harmlessness
2) economic equity
3) social justness
4) cultural diversity
Sustainable art also encompasses the concept of stewardship, which is the responsible choice and manipulation of materials, and the concern for their physical sources/origins, as much as for their impact on ecosystems.
Since the beginning of the 20th century, we observe the existence of artists who produce art that meet the criteria of sustainability, regardless their consciousness or not about environmental issues. Difficultly, artists producing before the 1960's knew anything about climate change and decreasing rates of biodiversity. Nevertheless, their work carried on through time some elements that suit our present concerns and needs, and bridges them to the contemporary visual art world, which also has lots of excellent art work that fits our need for sustainability, and, above all, the always desired artistic expression.
Although it is not always clear if these contemporary artists are making art with sustainability in mind, their art may be found in C O 2 * as they fit the main purpose this blog, which is that of displaying art work that carries within itself the concern for “meet[ing] the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”.
Illustrating C O 2 * 's purposes, we have the work of Anne Percoco entitled "Indra's Cloud", which is a mobile public sculpture made of used PET bottles during the time the artist was spending working for a NGO in at the Vrindavan region in India in 2008. While bringing to life a local myth, Anne Percoco's sculpture also drew attention to the severely polluted condition of the Yamuna River.
_______________sources:
(1) Earth Charter
(2) United Nations General Assembly (1987) "Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development: Our Common Future".Transmitted to the General Assembly as an Annex to document A/42/427- Development and International Co-operation: Environment
(3) Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development: Our Common Future: IV. A call for action.
(4) Maja and Reuben Fowkes. "The Principles of Sustainability in Contemporary Art"
(5) Alicia Murría. "Art, Crisis and Ecology"
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