Dear Earth: Art and Hope in a Time of Crisis.
An exhibition that explored the interdependence of ecologies and ecosystems, and our connection with nature, through the idea that care is a form of resistance.
![Installation view of Andrea Bowers [Credit: Mark Blower, courtesy Hayward Gallery]. The hanging sculpture Memorial to Arcadia Woodlands Clear-Cut (Green, Violet, and Brown) commemorates a forest in California that Bowers attempted to save by climbing and tying herself to an oak tree alongside three other activists. The brightly coloured drawings from her Eco Grief Extinction Series lament the loss of Hawaiian flora and fauna recently declared extinct.](https://miro.medium.com/v2/resize:fit:1400/format:webp/0*GXt4A7DEuWSdDlXW.jpeg)
Bringing together 15 artists from around the world, this Hayward Gallery exhibition — Dear Earth: Art and Hope in a Time of Crisis — explores the interdependence of ecologies and ecosystems, as well as our emotional connection with nature. It was inspired by artist Otobong Nkanga’s suggestion that:
‘caring is a form of resistance’.
The Closing Ritual — an evening to close the exhibition — provided visitors chance to view the exhibit as well as engage in presentations and performances that discussed themes from the show. To me it was a no brainer; same price as an exhibition ticket, and yet extra special things included.
This article highlights the works on show, along with thoughts about their place and meaning. The Closing Ritual bits are integrated within the main exhibition pieces. I’ve chosen to segment them into self-derived themes of: extract, observe, care, activate.
Different forms of care are made visible throughout the exhibition, whether through nurturing communities, tending to plants or joining protests. Many of the artists foreground the interconnected nature of all beings and challenge us to engage and empathise with non-human perspectives.
Extract.
The extraction of natural resources from our Earth is destructive. Very rarely is any care given, or those resources returned in the same condition, if ever returned at all.
The artists and works highlighted here all discussed extraction.
Otobong Nkanga.
Otobong Nkanga’s work opened the exhibition. It was her suggestion that ‘care is a form of resistance’ that established and inspired the showcase. But how to go from extraction to care when they’re so juxtaposing?
The eye-catching small paintings really drew me in — particularly the ones shown below: Enclosure, Masterplan and Extraction. The more you looked, the more you saw. Amputated limps had morphed into propagated plants — or was it the other way around? The graphic clarity was mesmerising, and even though they were depicting harsh images, such as land grabbing and barbed wire, there was a softness to them that seems to say there’s a different way to go about things.
In Pursuit of Bling portrayed photographs of luxurious-looking minerals that reflected on the hand-mining that occurred in Green Hill, Namibia by the Ovambo people before German colonial industrial mining started in 1900 for a century. Nkanga had visited this mine, now a gaping hole in the ground.
As you entered the exhibition, you were immediately struck by a full fallen tree, unsure if it was real or not. It was hooked up to biospheres that had become mini ecosystems. The Trifurcation showcased a naturally-fallen sweet chestnut with the glass bubbles hinting at regeneration. To me there’s a question here of whether regeneration can occur from extraction — if it was a clear felled tree, would there be regrowth from the same organism?
Lastly there was a huge woven tapestry — Double Plot — with similar vibes as the small paintings; networks of lines that could be outlines of mountains or continents, with discs resembling planets but up close depicted explosions and riots. The tree features again, and the human figure underneath it seems to be both controlled and controlling, all connecting back to other motifs in the piece, suggesting that there’s always two sides to a story (two plots).
Richard Mosse.
Since 2018, Richard Mosse has been working in the Amazon Basin using specialist imaging technology to capture environmental information that is invisible to the human eye. This technology is also used by scientists reporting on ecological degradation, along with profit-driven companies looking for new mining and agribusiness prospects.
The vibrant photos of Oil Spill on Kichwa Territory I + II and Abandoned Oil Plant Infrastructure show the world in technicolour. They look like fun flirty scenes. In the latter is shown plants growing amongst industrial pipes, a Chernobyl-esque scene (for lack of knowledge on anything to compare it to). In the former series is a forest scene with the glistening of oil in the water stream. Multispectral imaging techniques (whatever they are) ‘capture narrow bands of light at specific points across the electromagnetic spectrum’.
The 32 minute film Grid (Palimi-ú) features Yanomami people speaking in turn on issues caused by illegal mining and agribusiness around their village of Palimi-ú near the Brazil-Venezuela border. On an accompanying grid of screens, multispectral photographs (those again) that were captured by drones flying over sites of environmental crimes in the rainforest are displayed.
Observe.
The exhibition focuses on artworks that seek to rekindle our bond with the natural world as a means of developing new attitudes and sustainable ways of being. There’s no denying that we are extractive and will continue to be extractive, but we can also put ourselves in the dynamic position as observer, to recognise and then understand what consequences our actions have. These artists take the anguish of extraction and choose to observe to highlight their findings.
Hito Steyerl.
I’m not usually one for tech works like this one from Hito Steyerl, and ordinarily I likely wouldn’t engage with the information plaque, but it was actually quite lovely. The installation Green Screen draws attention to our dependence on tech and the consequential carbon footprint, suggesting engaging with the material world could be more nuanced and observant than it is destructive.
The LED screen is constructed from empty glass bottles and plastic crates with the other side showing a wall of living plants. The room is lit up by flickering colours and twinkling sounds. What you wouldn’t know unless you read the info is that bioelectrical signals from the plants are converted to into the sounds and pixelated images of flowers shown on the screen. Building on developments created by Berlin’s community of c-base hackerspace digital activists, this work explores the complexities of our desire for material goods while also craving nurturing relationships.
Cornelia Parker.
In THE FUTURE (Sixes and Sevens), Cornelia Parker asks a class of primary school children questions about what they imagine their future to be like. It makes reference to a 1964 TV documentary Seven Up! Where 7-year-olds were asked what they wanted to be when they grew up, along with an idiom (that I’ve never heard of) ‘at sixes and sevens’ meaning confusion and disarray.
The children’s responses, expressions and thought processes are captivating. The white blonde girl was particularly sassy, and I feel if anything it highlights the role of education at home. What adults speak of and how they act is seeping into children, whether their own kin or not. How does discrimination in school, or available opportunities for exploration affect how children grow to think and contemplate?
Cristina Iglesias.
The immersive environment of Pabellón de Cristal I from Cristina Iglesias encourages visitors to sit above a metal mesh floor, looking down to water flowing over a surface that resembles a limestone geological feature. The green glass room is reflective yet cloudy, and the grid floor makes what’s hidden unclear. It’s a statement of how we have constructed roads and buildings yet water flows underneath, and we need to stop awhile to consider where we’re standing. I would’ve appreciated it more had the space been quiet and empty, but as it was there were lots of folk chatting away so I couldn’t immerse fully.
Agnes Denes.
Agnes Denes employs scientific methods and techniques in her work to portray abstract representations of the natural world. I recently came across her through Instagram, when someone had posted the image of the Wheatfields in New York (also shown in this exhibit).
The detailed drawing Studies of Time (Exploration of Time Aspects) depicted the globe — or rather the pole as centre — on gridded paper with words and phrases all related to time, matter, energy and space. Frankly a lot of it (most of it) goes over my head, so I don’t know where she pulled it from or why they’re placed where they are, but I appreciated the graphicness of this drawing and that it highlights knowledge, memory and consciousness stretching away across a linear plane in relation to each other.
Jenny Kendler.
Birds Watching III from Jenny Kendler isn’t the type of art I would normally stop and ponder. I’m really just into minimalism, graphics, crafts. I actually find this work confronting, though that’s likely the point. It features the eyes of one hundred bird species that are threatened by the climate crisis, reminding us that when we look at nature, it’s looking back at us. The eyes are printed on a reflective material so will glow in shone light (though this didn’t happen while I was there), and the represented species were selected in consultation with the Zoological Society of London focussing on birds that are part of their global conservation efforts. An information board pointed you to each eye and the respective species, including UK native birds of conservation concern such as the Long-eared Owl, Northern Wheatear, Ring-necked Duck and Common Eider.
It was also shown in conjunction with another installation; Tell it to the Birds is a concave steel bowl stood upright like a satellite dish, covered inside with moss and a hidden microphone. Visitors are invited to voice a secret and the words are converted into birdsong. A kid nearby was unsure about participating, so I showed him how to use it. It was cute, and it is as if the birds are listening and responding.
Care.
Daiara Tukano.
Daiara Tukano belongs to the Yépá Mahsã people (widely known as Tukano). Central to Tukano cosmology is the belief that human beings are equal participants in a dialogue with everything that exists. Daiara’s paintings are inspired by her research into Tori — ‘cosmo-visions’ triggered by consuming ‘Kahpi’, a plant-based medicine with psychedelic effects. Such visions are believed to be key to understanding our entangled relationship with the universe.
The two works shown in the gallery were site-specific to portray:
‘a forest that is living, that is talking and telling stories. It’s a forest that manifests memory, wisdom and intelligence’.
The full wall Pirõ nīkī (Forest of the Serpent) acrylic painting is simple black and white, but has movement and life in it with particularly captivating animal motifs. A felled tree stump is the centre, showcasing the regeneration considered in Otobong Nkanga’s The Trifurcation earlier on. It all flows into one.
Agnes Denes.
Here in another of my segments, Agnes Denes’ probably most popular work Wheatfield — A Confrontation. The artist sowed, tended to and harvested two acres of wheat on a landfill site beside the World Trade Centre in Manhattan to address (confront) world trade, greed, mismanagement, world hunger and ecological concerns. The photo shows the wheatfield with a symbol of freedom and opportunity — The Statue of Liberty on Ellis Island — in the background.
We must take care to educate ourselves, hold awareness and nurture the land. Capitalism expects us to constantly move, consistently take, forever surrender; but this environmental act offers a new path. We can fight back with something as simple as sowing seeds or perhaps a little further, utilising wasted land, if we give the space to observe and then care.
Cherry Truluck.
Out of Time was an artistic culinary performance from Cherry Truluck as part of the Closing Ritual. She narrated a piece from her The Animist Almanac regarding research into oat cultivation and temporal rhythms in farming. A TV screen projected Truluck’s hands as she unravelled an oat stem. It took care to recite the words, to carefully peel apart the stalk, to deliver a rosy libation ‘for the super blue moon’ made from golden oat grains.
The act of growing anything requires care, commitment and patience. The act of harvesting requires similar, because you don’t want to undo all of the work. The same can be said for an art practice, or for an political action — you need to research, to consider, to develop. The performance and beverage gift were magical in themselves, but we also went away with a little packet of sowans to use before the next full moon.
The new harvest + green oat sobrio:
Golden oat grains (a heritage variety called Tam Finlay) harvested recently in Somerset were combined with green oat stems (Blythe) grown out of season in a glasshouse in Wales. The oat grains would normally be left to ripen before processing, but instead the slightly milky whole grains were pressed, steeped and infused with rose petals and field herbs inspired by traditional ayurvedic moon milk. The oat stems, interrupted just as they reached the point of floral initiation, make a sweet and earthy syrup for the drink.
Sowans:
An ancient Scottish recipe made after harvest from the husks of oats which are fermented in water. Once the husks are removed, the liquid is separated into a thick yoghurty layer (the sowans) and a thin watery liquid (the swats). Both can be consumed. There are versions of sowans in other cultures, most notably Russian ‘kissel’, which can be traced back to the 10th century.
I had my sowans on the eve of the full Harvest moon on September 29th in a mug of warm milk with a spoon of raw honey.
Activate.
Andrea Bowers.
An ecofeminist, Andrea Bowers create multimedia art that confronts human rights issues, particularly those that affect women. Shown above is the main work — Memorial to Arcadia Woodlands Clear-Cut (Green, Violet and Brown) — a hanging sculpture that includes pieces of wood chippings from the site of a felled oak tree in California that Bowers attempted to prevent through direct action.
I wasn’t particularly drawn to this, but did like the flickering neon light switching from ‘climate change’ to ‘climate change is real’. Another neon light shows sycamore leaves with the phrase: ‘Women have always thought like mountains’ in the centre. These two feel more direct in what they are portraying, and could easily be displayed to capture public attention, whereas the sculpture and paintings would need more consideration. Where does activation come from? Is it that sudden anguish and adrenaline to do something, to do anything, or is it more thoughtful and slow-burning?
Love Ssega.
Multidisciplinary artist Love Ssega performed two poems as part of The Chapters of Hope at the Closing Ritual. With a backdrop of the Jenny Kendler bird eyes and a red sunset over the north bank London skyline on the evening of the super blue moon, slight wind whipping up, it was bewitching. I was particularly drawn to the piece The Welsh are Reclaiming their Mountains, especially as I was two days later heading into the Welsh mountains. It spoke of activism in another form; grassroots narrative. Wales reclaiming their culture and language is significant, especially when regarding the need for resilience and transformation in the face of ecological crises.
Panel discussions.
As part of the Closing Ritual there were also three panel discussions exploring the intersection of art and activism. One between the Hayward’s Chief Curator and artist Cornelia Parker considered the role of art to drive action; for this I wrote down “anger vs hope in raising awareness” in response to how art could inspire us to act, something I mentioned above with Andrea Bowers neon light works.
The second panel was between Heather Ackroyd (of studio Ackroyd + Harvey) and three London activists. I’m unsure if there was another room that I missed, but portraits of these activists (and others) by the studio were displayed. The talk included: Destiny Boka-Batesa, one of the founders of the clean air campaign Choked Up, who is raising awareness of the disproportionate effect of air pollution on Black and Brown Londoners; Helene Schulz of London Freedom Seed Bank, which is building an urban seed commons and distributing London-grown seed for free; and Julian Lahai-Taylor from Grow Lewisham, a collective committed to improving access to local land, growing organic food and restoring degraded soil. I reckon that these projects really provoked new thoughts for the event attendees, especially with Helene’s explanation of agrochemical companies and their power over food security.
Funnily, by the third panel I was already feeling too hungry to concentrate. It was between Earthrise, Hauser & Wirth and the Design Museum on the topic of storytelling and collaboration across sectors. I did note down before I left, that they made a distinction between art and design, so how that would impact the way a story is told. Perhaps design shouldn’t leave room for interpretation, whereas with art we assume that that’s what’s required.
Final thoughts.
Not all artists are included in this write-up; there’s no real point me trying to give musings on works that don’t speak to me, though that does mean that in hindsight I lose context. The segments I created: Extract, Observe, Care and Activate were a way for me to compartmentalise and disseminate the ways in which art can affect how a person may perceive and consider such ecological crises shown in this exhibit e.g. deforestation, mining, carbon emissions, food insecurity, land grabbing.
The questions I’ve posed are personal. Writing exhibition reviews like this are a journal of sorts, a way to make sense of what I’ve seen. But I do encourage you to look at the works yourself (maybe with additional research) to consider your own reactions.
Learn more about the Closing Ritual and of the Dear Earth exhibition itself.
Thank you so much for reading through. Do comment if you have something to say. And if you appreciated the content, why not share with someone who also would. Follow for these once-weekly articles at the intersection of food, fibre and fashion — and wider ecosystems surrounding them all. You can also donate a coffee via Ko-fi.
Stephanie Steele is the founder of Steele Studio, a space that educates everyday folk on the interconnectedness of our food, fibre and fashion systems through community courses and workshops. As an organic food grower and textiles sustainability specialist, she otherwise writes about art, textiles, plants, running and systems design.
Originally published at www.stephaniesteele.co.uk/blog on October 3rd, 2023.
