15 October 2024
Speaker
Waseda University, Tokyo
Invited by James Jack and the Eco Art Lab;
Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan,
15 October 2024
he lecture Ecological Practices in Art and Curating: Post-Exhibitionary Practices—Art and Curating in Ecological Thought, delivered at James Jack’s Eco Art Lab at Waseda University on 15 October 2024, examined how curating and exhibition-making can move beyond institutional spaces and representational “show-and-tell” formats. Post-exhibitionary practice was introduced as a participatory and sustainable form of making things public, embedded in communal life and oriented towards the collective production of knowledge.
Drawing on situated knowledges and theories of interdependence, the lecture approached ecology not only as a relationship between humans and nature but, through the Greek oikos, as a critical consideration of the shared household. Ecology was positioned as an artistic and scientific practice of connection, self-reflection, and responsibility within more-than-human environments and planetary relations.
Donna Haraway’s proposition that “we are compost, not posthuman” provided a framework for understanding composting as both a material process and a curatorial methodology. Composting describes unexpected collaborations, the disruption of disciplinary categories, and the transformation of different forms of knowledge into fertile ground for collective action and joyful resistance. These ideas were discussed through examples including the Composting Knowledge network, translocal study trips, and Maya Minder’s ecological and participatory artistic practices.