Yearly Archives: 2012

Hitting the high water mark before Sandy

Eve Mosher: High Water Line

This post comes to you from Ashden Directory

Wallace Heim writes:

The Talk of the Town in the New Yorker last week was all about Sandy. Elizabeth Kolbert framed her piece on the impossibility of flood protection around an artwork by Eve Mosher.

Using a Heavy Hitter, the machine to make chalk lines on baseball fields, Mosher drew a blue line around the edge of Brooklyn and lower Manhattan ten feet above sea level, the height that waters were expected to rise during a once-in-a-hundred-year flood.

Mosher’s plan with High Water Line was to leave a visual mark and to open up a space for conversation, in 2007.

“I have pictures of where I drew the line and, if you look at the debris line, they’re pretty close”, Mosher writes on her blog, continuing, “I never wanted to be right.”

“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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International Call for Papers, Posters, Transdisciplinary Activities and Installations for Balance-Unbalance 2013

http://www.balance-unbalance2013.org

CALL deadline EXTENDED: DECEMBER 08, 2012

Balance-Unbalance is an International Conference designed to use art as a catalyst to explore intersections between nature, science, technology and society as we move into an era of both unprecedented ecological threats and transdisciplinary possibilities. We are thoroughly looking forward to hosting artists, scientists, economists, philosophers, politicians, sociologists, engineers and policy experts from across the world to engage in dialogue and action towards a sustainable future. Balance-Unbalance 2013 will also host a diversity of virtual components allowing global accessibility and significantly reducing the carbon footprint of a major international conference.

One of the main goals of Balance-Unbalance is to develop the role of the arts and artists in dealing with environmental challenges. The previous events held in Buenos Aires in 2010 and Montreal in 2011 ( http://balance-unbalance2011.hexagram.ca ) provided a powerful platform for reflection, debate, and ideas leading towards Balance-Unbalance 2013, hosted in the UNESCO Noosa Biosphere Reserve on the Sunshine Coast of Australia. The 2013 conference theme, Future Nature, Future Culture[s] is aimed to provoke discourse around what our elusive future might hold and how transdisciplinary thought and action could be used as tools for positive change.

Submissions are now being accepted for the International Balance-Unbalance 2013 conference to be held at Central Queensland University in Noosa, Australia from May 31 – June 2, 2013. Balance-Unbalance 2013 is being held in the beautiful resort town of Noosa, in parallel with the Floating Land 2013 Green Art festival and just prior to the ISEA 2013 (International Symposium on Electronic Art) conference in Sydney, so participants can maximise their time in Australia by attending all three events.

For more information see our website on http://www.balance-unbalance2013.org
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/balanceunbalance

Arts and Environment Symposium

This post comes to you from Cultura21

A two-day colloquium to facilitate dialogue about the role of art in environmental education and stewardship. Participants will look at bridges that have been built across the divide of the arts and environment and will image in others that might be created.

Saturday, March 19

6-7:30 p.m.: Arts and the Environment Colloquium Keynote Lecture. Museum of Art, Helmut Stern Auditorium – 525 South State St. Sponsored by: Office of the Vice President for Research, Department of English Language and Literature, Department of Dance, and the University of Michigan Museum of Art

Keynote Speakers: David Abram and Jennifer Monson

The public is invited to this event as part of a two-day Arts and the Environment Colloquium exploring the role of art in environmental education and stewardship.David Abram is an American philosopher, writer, and cultural ecologist and the award-winning author of Becoming Animal: An Earthly Cosmology, and The Spell of the Sensuous. Jennifer Monson is a professor in the Department of Dance at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and founder and director of iLAND- Interdisciplinary Laboratory for Art, Nature and Dance.

8-8:30 p.m. Arts and the Environment Colloquium Multimedia Performance. Museum of Art, Apse – 525 South State St.

Sponsored by:  Office of the Vice President for Research, Department of English Language and Literature, Department of Dance, and the University of Michigan Museum of Art.

Created by: Sara Adlerstein (UM School of Natural Resources and Environment), Evan Chambers, Jessica Fogel, Joseph Gramley (UM School of Music, Theater and Dance), and Keith Taylor (UM – College of Literature, Science, and the Arts)

Beginning in 2008, an interdisciplinary team of University of Michigan faculty members and students worked collaboratively to create a unique and multilayered performance based upon the element of water entitled Mapping the River. Taking the cycle of water from rain to earth to river to lake to ocean to clouds to rain as its overarching structure, and focusing on our local water source the Huron River as a central narrative, the work features live music, dance, video, and spoken word. At the Arts and the Environment colloquium, the team members will present an adaptation of Mapping the River specifically designed for the UMMA Apse space.

Mapping the River music is composed by Professor Evan Chambers, chair of the Composition Department. Professor Joseph Gramley, chair of the Percussion Department performs with his students. Writer Keith Taylor, Lecturer in English Language and Literature and editor of The Huron River: Voices from the Watershed, contributes text. Choreographer Jessica Fogel, Professor of Dance, creates choreography for the work, performed by UM dance majors. Video is conceived by all of the original team members including graphic designer Doug Hesseltine, Associate Professor of Art and Design, and filmed and edited by Emmy Award winning videographer Christie Vedjes. Sara Adlerstein, Associate Research Scientist in the School of Natural Resources and Environment, contributes scientific conceptual frameworks, and also her paintings of bodies of water, which are integrated into the video. Lighting design is by Mary Cole, Staging and Lighting Supervisor of the U-M Department of Dance, with costume designs by Suzanne Young.

Sunday, March 20: Building community and future planning for sustained activity and collaboration

  • 9-10 a.m. Opening session. Panelists include:
    • Joseph Trumpey (Associate Professor – Art and Design)
    • Robert Grese (Professor -SNRE)
    • Paul Webb (Professor -SNRE; director, PiTE)
    • Leslie Sobel (Local visual artist)
    • Laura Rubin (Director, Huron River Watershed Council)
    • Evan Chambers (Professor – Music, Theater and Dance)
    • Jessica Fogel (Professor -Music, Theater and Dance)
    • Keith Taylor (Lecturer – LS&A)
    • Sara Adlerstein (Associate Research Scientist – SNRE)
  • 10 a.m.-noon Breakout session: State of the Art: Where we are
  • 1:30-3:30 p.m. Breakout session: Envisioning the future: Where we want to go
  • 3:30-4:30 p.m. Summary session

Registration: artsandenvironmentcolloquium@umich.edu

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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eBook: Promoting natural materials

This post comes to you from Cultura21

This free eBook, edited by Päivi Simi and Outi Toumela, is the main publication of the long term project of the same title, taking place in Southern Finland and Estonia from 2009 to 2012.

The focus of the project lies in raising awareness and spreading knowledge on the use of healthier materials as well as on the environmental importance of using local materials.

From the back-cover:

What are natural materials? Basically, every material is originally natural. Even humans are composed of pure natural materials. We need better definitions like ecological materials, local materials, renewable resources, organic materials, and so on. We also need recyclability as well as a free flow of information. Everything we do or consume locally also affects globally. We must not forget that we have options.

Click here for the full eBook

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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Call for Program Planner – Pixelache Helsinki 2013 Festival

This post comes to you from Cultura21
The Pixelache Helsinki Festival 2013, a festival of electronic art and subcultures, organized in Helsinki since 2002 is looking for organizations, groups or individuals who would like to organize a seminar and an exhibition for the Facing North – Facing Southprogram of Pixelache in Helsinki in 2013, with the hope that the program will bring interesting insights and points of views to the question of North-South relationships.

The selected organization, group or individual will be given a production budget and a fee for the realization of the Facing North – Facing South seminar and exhibition.

Application deadline: 5.12.2012

More information & the application form: http://www.pixelache.ac/helsinki/festival-2013/

This year, the Pixelache Helsinki Festival is organized as a dual-city event, both in Helsinki, Finland and Tallinn, Estonia during 16-19 May 2013, representing their overall theme Facing North – Facing South.

With this theme, Pixelache expands it’s on-going Signals from the South program, that has focused on presenting media, art and technology projects from Africa, South America and Asia since 2009. It further explores the relationships between South and North, looking at these notions from various perspectives, including geo-political, cultural, economical, both on global, regional and local levels.

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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Big Coal Bullying Prompts University to Destroy Artwork

This post comes to you from EcoArtScotland

Sadly Chris Drury’s sculpture in Wyoming is to be destroyed, as reported by Mary Anne Hitt: Big Coal Bullying Prompts University to Destroy Artwork.

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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On Art’s To-Do List: Climate Change

This post comes to you from EcoArtScotland

Connect the dots: Edvard Munch’s Scream, Amy Balkin‘s Public Smog, Peter Fend‘s current show at Peanut Underground and Lawrence Weiner’s 2011 work  WATER FINDS ITS OWN LEVEL HOWSOEVER.  Answer at

On Art’s To-Do List: Climate Change | GalleristNY.

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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