In the arts, artificial ecosystems and speculative concepts of nature offer the possibility of imagining and visualizing new planetary worlds. This includes utopian visions of alternative orders and fluid classifications as well as hybrid, unusual interweavings of nature and technology. The panel discussion will focus on the question to what extent artistic ecologies and nature(s), being anticipated in contemporary art, turn away from the seemingly dystopian narrative of the Anthropocene, which places humanity at the center, in favor of positive, hopeful, but also playful narratives through eco-fictional strategies. In the face of advancing climate change and species extinction, do artists (still/again) refer to the historical topos of the demiurge or ‘deus sculptor‘, contributing to unexpected forms of worlding? Opposed to the immediacy and promise of authenticity of ‘real nature‘, their fabulated imaginary worlds lead to an overlapping of different realities.
CHAIR
// Julian Stalter (LMU München) and Ursula Ströbele (HBK, Braunschweig)
PANEL
// Caroline A. Jones is an art historian specializing in modern and contemporary art with a focus on its technological production, distribution, and reception, as well as the art-science interface. She is currently researching "the anthropogenic image" of environmental disaster, with an emphasis on political contestation and occlusion. Jones is a Professor in the History, Theory, and Criticism section of the Department of Architecture, as well as Associate Dean for Strategic Initiatives at MIT.
// Anne Duk Hee Jordan is an artist who explores transience and transformation, inviting a shift in perspective away from the human towards the whole ecology. She works with materials such as motorized elements, organic matter, and edible landscapes to create interactive sculptures. Jordan is a Professor for Digital Media at HfG Karlsruhe.
// Pınar Yoldaş is an artist who works with digital technologies and biological sciences to create architectural installations, kinetic sculptures, and video, focusing on themes such as post-humanism, eco-nihilism, speculative biology, and feminist techno-science. Yoldaş is an Associate Professor at UC San Diego.