Sustainable Artistic Production
- Rui Blix
- Jul 8, 2021
- 8 min read
Updated: Oct 25, 2024
Note: This text is an excerpt. For the full text and complete bibliography, please contact via email.
I propose a tool for analyzing how to implement multiple sustainability goals in artistic productions or creative processes, both in well-established and exploratory artistic practices. I have chosen to name the model “How to Implement Sustainability Goals for Artistic Production” (HisGap). This model has been developed based on my own experiences related to my artistic practice, with the aim of addressing several sustainability goals.
What are the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals in the fields of art and design?
The Sustainable Development Goals are the world’s common agenda for eradicating poverty, combating inequality, and slowing climate change by 2030 (UN Association, 2021, UN’s Sustainable Development Goals). The interdisciplinarity of the theme and the need for innovation can make sustainability very interesting and relevant for contemporary art and art education. However, this emerging topic may lack a well-established artistic practice with proven methods to support it.
Increasingly, professional bodies are conducting research and developing concepts related to sustainability, such as systems thinking, future orientation, normative competence, strategic competence, collaborative competence, critical thinking, and self-awareness. A combination of all these competencies is referred to in sustainability education as “integrated problem-solving competence.” This is defined as the ability to apply different frameworks and solutions to complex issues as a basis for developing viable, equitable, and inclusive solutions that promote sustainable development.
I interpret this in this case as us facing a new context that we must navigate ourselves. We need to seek creative solutions together through mapping, exploration, reflection, and problem-solving.
Since my experience is that currently only the theme of redesign addresses a small part of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals in the fields of art and design, I want to discuss why this is the case and how we might incorporate more of the sustainability goals than we do today.
The professional book Bærekraftdidaktikk i kunst og håndverk - gjenbruke – oppvinne – skape (Sustainability Education in Art and Craft - Reuse - Repurpose - Create), which mainly focuses on art education in primary schools, seems to emphasize UN’s sustainability target 12.5. The goal states: “significantly reduce waste generation through prevention, reduction, recycling, and reuse” (UN Association, 2021, UN’s Sustainable Development Goals). The book refers to the necessity of a holistic aesthetic change and development across many different competencies (Naumann, Riis, and Illeris, 2020, p. 27), but largely deals only with reuse techniques and recycling. This is a very small part of the UN’s sustainability goals. This professional book on sustainability education in the subject of art and craft perhaps reflects a lack of interdisciplinary knowledge. It may also indicate a political or educational reluctance to create new traditions. Perhaps this is something artists, critics, mentors, and teachers can relate to. If so, this could stem from everything from aesthetic habits to economic factors and is too complex to delve into further in this text.
However, a sustainably good artwork may demonstrate a capacity for change regarding technique, materials, and message. A good sustainable artwork might also lead to a shift in society’s preferences for a work’s aesthetics. The aesthetics of a work will likely need to change if artists and their audiences become more aware of sustainable productions.
Creating an interdisciplinary teaching program or an interdisciplinary artistic production that addresses the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals can be approached as an exploratory project for both the mentor and the student, and can be an ideal situation for developing new creative abilities. However, it is difficult to find literature on sustainability education that addresses a holistic, interdisciplinary mindset and method for such teaching.
Sustainability education within the arts appears to lack a definition for sustainable, artistic creative processes and sustainable aesthetics from a more holistic perspective.
Sustainable aesthetics, as I understand it, is a type of artwork that relates to sustainability in a comprehensive manner regarding material choices, themes, and techniques, as Eisner refers to in his criteria for art evaluation (see bibliography for more information). Following Eisner’s criteria, a work should not only demonstrate knowledge of technique, method, and theme but also possess the impact that is often considered important in all art—a expressiveness that can change the values of its audience. With this perspective as a starting point, I believe that future artworks should increasingly reflect a process where sustainable themes are problematized throughout the entire creative process.
It becomes crucial that the issues arising from engagement with sustainable themes are genuine and untested. This is necessary to preserve innovation and change in the art field.
Artists and their students can shift the artistic environment and discourse toward more sustainable themes. However, this requires everyone involved to develop the competence to explore how to do so and to create new methods and traditions within sustainable frameworks. We should be able to identify new criteria and objectives that move us toward a more sustainable creative process, in line with rapid adaptability. We need to be able to problematize the artistic methods, traditions, and techniques that exist today in relation to sustainability.
How to Implement Sustainability Goals for Artistic Production.
I therefore propose a visual model that hopefully can address more of the UN Sustainable Development Goals than “redesign” currently does in the literature on art and design. The model implements several of the UN goals and ensures that students reflect more on methods, techniques, and material choices. This self-produced analytical model can hopefully be used for sustainable, critical reflections and further relevant investigations in the production of an artwork.
HisGap is a play on words about how sustainability was completely overlooked during the Industrial Revolution, mainly driven by a perspective where humans are separate from nature. The model illustrates how we, as part of nature and part of a larger system, should look towards a shared future and see ourselves as part of nature. The model does not provide a definitive answer or recipe for creative processes but can help users construct their own methods for artistic processes and reflection to independently maintain a sustainable perspective in their productions.
The function of the model is to ensure critical reflections and evaluations of one’s work against the UN Sustainable Development Goals. It can be used by students, teachers, art critics, and artists. Frequent use of the model can also aid in internalizing one’s thought processes and reflections about one’s own or others’ production in light of sustainability themes.
Working methodically with this model does not necessarily mean that the user will end up with a physical artwork that aligns with all of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. It depends on how much experience the user has or wishes to work purposefully with this. Nevertheless, the model will present the user with several issues that I believe are essential for mapping one’s practice in a sustainable context. The model helps establish a process where one reflects on and evaluates one’s artistic work in relation to the interdisciplinary theme of sustainability.
The model proposes overarching indicators grounded in the UN Sustainable Development Goals that I consider relevant for artistic practice. It presents a more holistic perspective on sustainability. HisGap can thus serve as a framework for observation, critique, analysis, and improvement. It can be adjusted by the user according to their varying competencies or desires. With repeated use, the user will develop a broader repertoire of methods for various sustainable creative processes. The model enables artistic choices that address complex, methodological, and comprehensive sustainability goals.
The model also illustrates how the relationships between the goals function between means and messages.
In the model’s “globe,” the largest circle on the left, five possible themes or messages for a sustainable artwork based on the UN Sustainable Development Goals are suggested. These themes are: energy use, social structures, economic structures (circular economy), environmental impacts, and finally, the reduction of CO2 and other environmental damages.
From these, an artist can select indicators of sustainability for the artwork to be created and subsequently quality assure ideas, concept development, material choices, and construction. One can also start from the other end; first look at the idea and then assess it against one or more of the five sustainability goals.
Here, I believe it is important to clarify that HisGap is not intended to represent the individual artist’s methods or the sequence of these methods but to serve as a supplement to them. The model can present an artist with the issue of sustainability in their own practice, which hopefully will increase critical reflection and contribute to better solutions in the long term. HisGap can also be used by art critics for evaluating works in a sustainable context, or by educators who are developing a sustainable teaching plan, as well as by students during instruction or peer assessments as a reference point that clarifies the sustainability theme.
The model will stimulate issues and create questions about techniques and methods, allowing students to map their own sustainability challenges in contemporary society. In this way, they can be prepared to develop a customized method for further researching their own processes. From this starting point, one can assess how to best develop one’s ideas, experimentation, and construction against the indicators that inform students whether they align with their own sustainability goals.
The model stimulates key competencies for sustainability, such as systems thinking and collective development. The model’s intention is to clarify the user’s own norms or practices by expanding the user’s insight into what is required for integrated problem-solving aligned with their own objectives.
Several other industries have already made significant progress in sustainability issues in the Western world, and it is essential that artistic communities learn from these advancements. Artists must venture into a more uncharted landscape, free from the traditions that have guided us up to the present. Therefore, we should also prepare future artists for the importance of these elements in art. Art may look different in the future if sustainability is to be incorporated into the evaluation of artworks. This is despite the fact that the aesthetic durability of an artwork is often sustainable in itself, as the lifespan of an artwork may far exceed that of other productions.
If the model is implemented in art education, it will at least maintain a more holistic approach to understanding the interdisciplinary theme of sustainable development.
Here’s the translation of your text:
Through the model, users are compelled to reflect on the artistic concept, material choices, transportation of materials, techniques, desired expression, and meaning of the work in relation to energy use, social structures, economic structures, and environmental impacts, as well as the reduction of CO2 and other environmentally harmful influences (the model’s five main indicators for sustainable art). Using the model can develop artists, art students, educators, and potentially others to assess artworks in a new and more sustainable way. It may also be possible that similar evaluations of artworks in the future could change our perception of what is considered aesthetic in light of sustainability.
-
This model was tested in the workshop The Dreamwork, at Prøverommet in the facilities of Aldea - Center of Contemporary Art, Design and Technology in Bergen in 2021, in collaboration with The Arctic Agency
You can listen to a podcast from participants and curators here.
To read more about the project and the digital publication related to The Arctic Agency’s The Dreamwork, visit: https://thearcticagency.com/the-dreamwork/
Literature.
Eisner, Elliot W. (2002) Arts and Creation of minds. (1.utg.) London, New
Haven. Yale University Press.
FN Sambandet. (2021, 19.04) FNs Bærekraftsmål. Hentet fra
Illeris, H. Näuman, R. Riis, K. (2020) Bærekraftsdidaktikk i kunst og Håndverk - Gjenbruke – Oppvinne – Skape. (1.utg.) Oslo. Cappelen Damm Akademisk.
UN Sustainable Developent Goals. (2021, 01.04) the Global SDG Indicators Database. Hentet fra https://unstats.un.org/sdgs/indicators/database/
Utdanningsdirektoratet. (2021) Kunst og visuelle verkemiddel
(KDA01‑02) Kompetansemål og vurdering. Hentet
Utdanningsdirektoratet. (2021) Overordna del; Bærekraftig utvikling. Hentet
Utdanningsdirektoratet. (2021) Tverrfaglege tema i Kunst og visuelle
virkemiddel (KDA 01 – 02). Hentet fra https://www.udir.no/lk20/kda01-
Winner, E, Sheridan, S, Hetland, L, Veenema, S, (2013) Studio thinking: The real benefits of visual arts education.(2.utg.) New York and London. Teachers College Press.
Comments