Ecological Art As Gift:
A Means To Facilitate Positive Changes In The World Water Crises

by Krisanne Baker

Water is the foundation of life; the connective might of the universe. Therefore sustaining the water systems must be the foundation of planning and development.[1]
--Betsy Damon,
‘Keepers of the Waters:
Visions and Solutions’

You may ask, “What is ‘ecological art’?” Ecological artist (EA) Aviva Rahmani defines ecological art as “a practice often in collaboration with scientists, architects, key planners, activists, engineers and other artists that result in direct intervention in environmental degradation. Often the artist is the lead agent in this work.”[2] Rahmani invites artists and researchers of all genres to collaborate and discourse the world’s mounting ecological problems in her weekly podcast at http://www.ghostnets.com.

Faced with environmental uncertainties, we need to rethink assumptions concerning conditions within reach of and beyond our own experiences. It's necessary to remember the limits of the give and take system between this planet and its inhabitants. Through their art, EA such as Aviva Rahmani, Ichi Ikeda, Betsy Damon, and Helen Mayer Harrison & Newton Harrison bring awareness and solutions to ecological problems worldwide. All five of these artists deal with issues of water in diverse manners and mediums.

There are hundreds of ecological artists currently at work on projects that will somehow bring attention to environmental problems, or embark upon solutions. This artist/writer became very aware of other EA upon viewing ‘Weather Report: Art & Climate Change’ curated by Lucy Lippard in 2007 at the Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art.[3] The blockbuster ecological art show formulated by Marda Kirn, Founder and Director of Eco/Arts, was an educational experience that I wished so many more people had the opportunity to experience. Indeed, as denials of environmental problems are finally being put to rest, one can find and experience a burgeoning number of ecologically concerned exhibitions.

One huge environmental issue is that of the Earth’s lifeblood: water quality and water availability (see www.watertreaty.org). Global warming, rerouted, polluted, or pumped dry water sources result in degraded changes in the environment and living conditions of all populations. Concern for survival motivates and inspires ecological artists to look hard at situational catalysts and incorporate healing* measures into their artistic practices—this often involves scientific and site-specific research, as well as active collaboration within a community whose inhabitants’ lives and areas of expertise touch upon or even produce the catalysts. (The world healing, or to heal is defined as a positive improvement or change in a system and used here describing the positive outcome ecological art has on an ailing environment and culture.) [4]

‘Threat to survival’ is the concept that through further entropic decline [5], there will not be enough potable water, air to breath, oceans to spawn fish, or arable land to sustain all living creatures on planet Earth. The decline manifests over more than a century of neglect and pollution, over-utilization of natural resources, growing industrialization and agribusiness, and most recently the privatization and commoditization of water. These compounding factors also weigh most heavily in early effects of global warming with changes in climate, weather patterns, acidification of our oceans, and rising sea levels.

In the case of worldwide waters and access rights to potable water, the paradigm of the crisis is that the minority (in this case politics and corporations) is transgressing the majority (the environment and its inhabitants). Ironically, the minority holds the power to control water—or as Christopher Manes says, we are experiencing “economic rage against the marginalization of the underclass and the monolithic power of multinational corporations. And there is a growing green rage against the destruction of the Earth and its breathtaking profusion of life.” [6]

For our fractured earth, we can reverse all of these entropic trends with ecological artists helping to lead the way in regeneration. Ecological art does just this: it emphasizes renewable gift to the environment and culture, shares knowledge, opens opportunities for dialogue, involves people socially in their communities and environment, and possibly even helps to advance issues of conflict into positively evolving directions. The artists’gifts given to the environment will, in turn, be given from the environment back to the people, meaning that it is possible for the decay and disorder of the world to move toward harmony and renewable energy sustaining a healthy environment and ensuring our survival.

[ Krisanne Baker is a Maine-based ecological artist and activist concerned specifically with water issues, and an art educator. ]