State of The Art: Crisis imaginaries, Techno-utopias, or Possible (Sustainable) Futures?

Speakers: Ionat Zurr, Nina Lykke, Meike Schalk, Caroline Elgh
Moderator: Marietta Radomska

Today, hope becomes hard work. Climate change, destruction of ecosystems, loss of biodiversity, wars, epidemics, and slow environmental violence evoke feelings of anxiety, anger and grief, manifested both globally and locally in culture, popular science, environmental activism, and art. With global warming unfolding in the Arctic four times faster than in the rest of the planet and the Baltic Sea turning into the largest ‘dead zone’ in the world, environmental crisis is acutely present in the social and cultural awareness close to home. 

Through various mediums, forms, and manifestations, art forges its own creative and critical arenas. These are the spaces where more-than-human crises are being re/imagined, where bio-and techno-utopias rise and fall, where care becomes a lesson, and where visions of possible futures are continuously mobilised and contested.  

Combining perspectives from such fields as Art/Science, environmental humanities, literature, architecture and design, as well as art-curatorial practice, the panellists will zoom in on the complex positioning, role, and potential of art and creative practices in the times of change, transformation, and uncertainty. 

The panel is combined with the launch of the book State of the Art – Elements for Critical Thinking and Doing (Helsinki 2023). Published by State of the Art Network, the volume takes a closer look at how practising artists, researchers, cultural actors, and engaged audiences can create elements for critical thinking and doing which can assist all of us in navigating the complexities of the present.

In English.

The panel is co-organised by The Eco- and Bioart Lab. The event is supported by FORMAS – A Swedish Research Council for Sustainable Development [grant number 2022-01728].

Biographies

Associate Professor Ionat Zurr is the Chair of the Fine Arts Discipline at the School of Design, The University of Western Australia. She is an artist-researcher, who formed the Tissue Culture & Art Project in 1996 which led to the establishment of SymbioticA: the Centre of Excellence in Biological Arts. Zurr’s collaborative ideas and projects reach beyond the confines of art and is often cited as an inspiration to diverse areas such as new materials, textiles, design, architecture, ethics, fiction, and food. Her co-authored book Tissues, Cultures, Art (Palgrave McMillan) was published in 2023. 

Nina Lykke  is a poet-philosopher and Professor Emerita of Gender Studies at Linköping University, Sweden, and Adjunct Professor at Aarhus University, Denmark. She* has participated in the building of Feminist Studies in Scandinavia and Europe more broadly since the 1970s. She* is co-founder of the International Network for Queer Death Studies. Her* monographs include: Cosmodolphins (2000), Feminist Studies (2010), and Vibrant Death (2022). 

Meike Schalk is an architect and Associate Professor in Urban Design and Urban Theory at KTH School of Architecture. Her research combines feminist inquiry into affects and effects of the current economical, physical, and social transformations of welfare housing; emerging scales of post-welfare landscapes; and environmental learning with practice-oriented research methods. Schalk is a member of the Artistic Research committee at the Swedish Research Council. She is a co-initiator of Aktion Arkiv.org 

Marietta Radomska is an Associate Professor of Environmental Humanities at Linköping University; director of The Eco-and Bioart Lab (https://ecobioartlab.net/); co-founder of Queer Death Studies Network; and co-editor of the book State of the Art: Elements for Critical Thinking and Doing (2023). She works at the intersection of environmental humanities, continental philosophy, queer death studies, visual culture, and artistic research; and has published in Australian Feminist Studies; Somatechnics; and Artnodes, among others. 

Caroline Elgh is an art curator, writer, educator, and PhD researcher in gender studies at Tema Genus, Linköping University. Her work within the fields of feminist environmental humanities, blue humanities and posthumanities explores postdisciplinary processes at the intersection of art, science, political ecology and speculative fiction. Since 2024 she is Co-Director of the multi-university platform The Posthumanities Hub. Previously she has been working as a curator at Bonniers Konsthall.

Image: Marietta Radomska