Notes on art and ecology

Enviromental care is not responsibility of artist but of every human being, especially for parents who want to leave behind an habitable world for their children. Art has an important role, as well as science, with the diference that science can produce proper actions to correct the problem (well, probably) but art is what activates the collective imaginary that allows us to change things. Artist care for every problem in society and although many of us may think that the climate change and other ecological problems are the most important other artist may have diferent opinions.

Nevertheless, art in all its forms has some special property that links it with ecology: that is its power to see beauty and meaning in the complexity of nature, something in which science sees bigger difficulties, because it is based on linear unidimensional thought, while art is characterized by the natural use and its capacity to apprehend complexity as well as bidimensional and tridimensional relationships. So, in the end, I belive that art has a very important role in the salvation of the world  although it can't do it alone. I understand the diversity of interests and preferences of other artists but I belive that it is important to encourage other artists to join forces with proyects that deal with enviromental care and ecology conservation.  I wrote "of the world" in black because I think the problem is that we would probably write "of our world" and that is the main problem. The world is not ours and like the Masai say We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children.

I have given a talk recently on the subject in madrid and I can tell you that every year more and more people around the art world are more and more interested in the links and dialogs between art and ecology, and that is an encouraging fact. As a member of an investigation group on art and ecology I dedicate myself to make this connection posible but the time we have left is so little that everything we do seems so little... That is why projects like this are so important.