Merging Horizons – Soil Science and Soil Art
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
Merging Horizons – Soil Science and Soil Art Alexandra Toland, Gerd Wessolek 2009 Berlin University of Technology, Institute of Ecology, Department of Soil Protection 1 Abstract A collection of canvases caked in colorful arrangements of browns and grays competes for space alongside an extensive accumulation of soil samples, old lab equipment, and remnants of assorted research projects in the basement of the Gorbatschow Building of the Berlin University of Technology. Remains of an artistic field experiment conducted last summer, the canvases mark the Soil Protection Department's attempts to integrate artistic dimensions into the soil science curriculum at the university. Such cross-disciplinary activities are gaining recognition elsewhere, as scientists, artists, educators, and environmentalists are developing a visual vernacular for the outermost skin of the earth. Why, when and in what context did soil science and art merge horizons? While incidental depictions of soil and geologic forms may be identified in virtually all major artistic genres, artwork explicitly dealing with soil and soil conservation issues is uniquely characteristic to the more recent environmental arts movement spanning over the last 50 years. Regarding the art-historical developments from the Land Art monuments of the 60s and 70s to more recent interdisciplinary remediation projects, it is important to distinguish between artworks that favor a symbolic, conceptual use of the “earth,” and those that more specifically make reference to “soil” as a geophysical, agronomic or ecological body. In this chapter, we introduce soil art as a subgenre of environmental art. We review the subject of soil throughout different historical developments of the environmental arts movement, look at several artists who have taken on soil as a fundamental focus of their artistic practice, and share some reflections on our own soil art experimentation at the TU- Berlin. Finally, we address the benefits and challenges of cross-disciplinary experimentation. It is our hope that a thoughtful combination of soil science and art will inspire new opportunities for collaborations within and beyond the soil science community. 1. Historical Roots 1.1 Earthworks and Land Art A plein-air extension of minimalism, Land Art, like happenings, interventions, installations and performance art, celebrated a distinct break from traditional forms of art making, art appreciation, and art theory. Unlike landscape painting, nature photography, and outdoor sculpture parks, Land Art incorporated the landscape not merely as subject or setting for the artwork but as an integral 2 part of it. The Land Art movement is perhaps best known for “Earthworks,” such as Robert Smithson’s iconic Spiral Jetty in the Great Salt Lake in Utah (1970), Michael Heizer’s Double Negative, cut into the Mormon Mesa in Nevada (1970), or Robert Morris’ Observatory in the Netherlands (1977). Many of the Land Artists also transported their perceptions of nature into museums and gallery spaces, isolating “earth” as an abstraction of the landscape. Prior to his herculean pursuits with bulldozers, Robert Smithson, for example, repeatedly framed simple arrangements of gravel, sand, salt and slate in mirrored corners of exhibition spaces and in wooden boxes on gallery floors. Smithson designated these minimalistic works with natural elements as “non-sites,” as opposed to actual sites in natural settings. Alongside Smithson’s Non-Site at the Dwan Gallery’s “Earthworks” exhibition in 1968, Robert Morris similarly exhibited a pile of soil and rock installed as a sculpture. In various exhibitions, Richard Long laid out arrangements of stones in museum settings, bringing attention to the raw materiality of natural elements, in juxtaposition with the contrived architectural context of the exhibition space. Artist Alan Sonfist similarly addressed the materiality of exhibition spaces in his Atlanta Earth Wall and Macomb Wall of Earth (1965). Here, the artist brought attention to the natural history architectural space by covering the outer walls with rippled sculptural facades made out of core samples taken from nearby sites. Many are also familiar with Walter de Maria’s New York Earth Room (1977). In this work, de Maria made reference to the lost natural history of New York by filling an entire gallery with 197 m3 of peat rich soil. Probably the most massive A-Horizon (uppermost layer of organic enriched soil) on the whole island of Manhattan, the New York Earth Room allows the viewer to experience the raw, rich odor and texture of an isolated oasis in the middle of a concrete jungle, creating an eerie monument to pre-Columbian New York. The definitive Land Art works were, however, embedded in the landscape. Far away from the white-walled safety of museums and gallery spaces, artists such as Michael Heizer, Richard Long, Robert Morris, Dennis Oppenheim, and Robert Smithson provoked new ways of interpreting art and experiencing the environment. Despite their groundbreaking contribution to art history, many of the monumental Land Art works often failed to acknowledge or protect the ecologies of the landscapes in which they were situated. When the state of California required artist team Christo and Jeanne-Claude to complete an environmental impact report for their 24 mile long Running Fence in 1976, attention shifted from the art world elite to a wider public discussion on the environment. While art critic Michael Auping (1983) commented on the negative ecological 3 repercussions of Land Art in his essay “Earth Art: A Study in Ecological Politics,” Allen Carlson (2002), professor of environmental aesthetics, even denounced some of the monumental earth works as being an “aesthetic affront to nature.” As cultural attitudes about environmental responsibility gradually shifted, artists adjusted their practice as well, ushering in a new canon of ephemeral, site-specific, ecologically conscious art that addressed nature for nature’s sake, and not simply as a novelty of the art world. Appearing in the same year as the “Earthworks” Exhibition, Joseph Beuys’ Earth Telephone (1968), consisting of a real telephone, earth, wire and straw, may thus be interpreted as a symbol of communication between artist and audience but also between humankind and nature. Earth Telephone (Fig. 1) represented a telepathic call for action, inviting other artists to follow a subtler, more sustainable path. Artists such as Charles Simonds and Ana Mendieta (among others) answered the call by creating ephemeral, allegorical works with soil that linked personal myths of creation with “the earth” as a fertile, celestial body. Works such as Alan Sonfist’s Time Landscape (1965- 1978), a recreation of a pre-colonial biotope in Manhattan, and Newton and Helen Mayer Harrison’s installation of an endangered meadow on the roof of the national art museum in Bonn (1996-1998) marked a new direction for the Land Art movement. Fig. 1: Joseph Beuys, Earth Telephone, 1968. 1.2 Ecological Art While Land Art can be traced back to a distinct period of postmodern artistic activity of the late 20th century, ecological art emerged as a critical response to Land Art around the same time period, and continues to thrive as a branch of contemporary art today. Ecological art addresses issues such as sustainable land use, natural processes, biodiversity, habitat conservation, and renewable resources. Two main approaches may be articulated here: artistic remediation that is primarily aesthetic and remediation that is also ecologically restorative. For example, Barbara Matilsky (1992 p. 56) makes a distinction between artists who have “proposed or created ecological artworks that provide solutions to the problems facing natural and urban ecosystems,” and artists who hone their 4 skills to attract attention or create awareness of environmental issues by “framing the problems through a variety of media…” Such a distinction becomes apparent with regard to artists working with soils. In Robert Smithson's Pour series, the artist literally dumped truckloads of asphalt and glass and barrels full of glue and sulphur down the slopes of already contaminated strip mines for the pure aesthetic enjoyment of watching the clattering, gooey descent. In contrast, Alan Sonfist sought to ameliorate such conditions by pouring rings of humus rich soil onto industrial brownfields. The airborne seeds that landed within the Pool of Virgin Earth (1975) brought new life to industrial wastelands. In the Grass Grows and Bowery Seeds works by Hans Haacke (1970), the artist similarly placed mounds of fertile soil on rooftops and in gallery spaces to exhibit the physical and biological processes of change, renewal, and decay. In another example, artist-biologist Kathryn Miller developed a bold but humorous series of artistic recultivations by literally “bombing” brownfields with grenade-like sculptures of soil and seeds from native plants (Fig. 2). Miller’s Seed Bombs (1992-2001) and Subdivision (1992-2001) soil mounds bring attention to the ecological potential of forgotten urban and industrial spaces. Fig. 2: Kathryn Miller, Seed Bombs, 1992. Another example is Paolo Barrile’s Message Earth (1961-2003). Well aware of the environmental art activities that had been going on in the United States, the Italian painter abandoned his formal painting career in the ’60s to launch an ambitious, long-term series of performances, installations and public interventions. His mission was to collect and redistribute soil samples from all over