Giovanni Aloi
School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Art History, Theory, and Criticism, Department Member
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Antennae: The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture, Publishing, Department MemberSotheby's Institute of Art, Contemporary Art, AdjunctTate, Public Programmes, Faculty Member add
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Art History, Animals in Art, Animals in Contemporary Art, Art, Visual Studies, Aesthetics, and 37 moreContemporary Art, Critical Plant Studies, Photography, Art Theory, Michel Foucault, History of Perspective in Painting, Iconography, Semiotics, Modern Art, Natural History Illustration, Art and Science, Surrealism, Natural History Dioramas, Renaissance, Museum, Abstract Art, Media Arts, Pop Culture and philosophy, Natural History, Nineteenth-century Art, Environmental Art, Popular Arts, Art and Climate Change, History, Cultural History, Environmental Sustainability, The Medieval Cult of Relics, Cabinets of Curiosities, Botanical History, Taxidermy, Thing Theory, New Materialism, Speculative Realism, CPS (Critical Plant Studies), Botany, History of Botany, and Taxonomy edit
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Dr. Giovanni Aloi is an art historian specializing in the history and theory of photography, representation of nature... moreDr. Giovanni Aloi is an art historian specializing in the history and theory of photography, representation of nature, and everyday objects in art. He has published with Columbia University Press, Phaidon, Laurence King, and Prestel and has been appointed co-editor of the University of Minnesota series Art after Nature. Since 2006, he has been the Editor in Chief of Antennae: The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture (www.antennae.org.uk). He currently lectures on modern and contemporary art at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and Sotheby’s Institute of Art in New York and London. edit
This is the introduction of Estado Vegetal This first book dedicated to Manuela Infante’s plant-focused performance by the same title. It features eight essays by scholars, poets, and artists whose practices draw from research fields as... more
This is the introduction of Estado Vegetal This first book dedicated to Manuela Infante’s plant-focused performance by the same title. It features eight essays by scholars, poets, and artists whose practices draw from research fields as disparate as new materialism, anthropogenic feminism, queer studies, and speculative realism. Including an interview with Infante, the full playscript, and stills from the performance, Estado Vegetal: Performance and Plant-Thinking reveals the roles that plants in art can play in productively reconfiguring human–nonhuman relations within current anthropogenic perspectives.
Introduction
Giovanni Aloi
The Right of the Other: Interpretation in Four Acts
Michael Marder
Thinking in the World: Estado Vegetal as Thought-Apparatus
Maaike Bleeker
Theatre as Thinking, Art as Nonknowledge
Lucy Cotter
Vegetal Mythologies: Potted Plants and Storymaking
Giovanni Aloi
Attending to “Plantness” in Estado Vegetal
Dawn Sanders
“I Can’t Move”: Plants and the Politics of Mobility in Estado Vegetal
Catriona Sandilands and Prudence Gibson
Feminist Structures: Polyphonic Networks
Sibila Sotomayor Van Rysseghem
Soledad: After Estado Vegetal
Mandy-Suzanne Wong
In Conversation
Manuela Infante and Giovanni Aloi
Estado Vegetal
Manuela Infante with Marcela Salinas
Acknowledgments
Contributors
Index
Introduction
Giovanni Aloi
The Right of the Other: Interpretation in Four Acts
Michael Marder
Thinking in the World: Estado Vegetal as Thought-Apparatus
Maaike Bleeker
Theatre as Thinking, Art as Nonknowledge
Lucy Cotter
Vegetal Mythologies: Potted Plants and Storymaking
Giovanni Aloi
Attending to “Plantness” in Estado Vegetal
Dawn Sanders
“I Can’t Move”: Plants and the Politics of Mobility in Estado Vegetal
Catriona Sandilands and Prudence Gibson
Feminist Structures: Polyphonic Networks
Sibila Sotomayor Van Rysseghem
Soledad: After Estado Vegetal
Mandy-Suzanne Wong
In Conversation
Manuela Infante and Giovanni Aloi
Estado Vegetal
Manuela Infante with Marcela Salinas
Acknowledgments
Contributors
Index
Research Interests:
This is the introduction to the edited volume 'Vegetal Entwinements in Philosophy and Art'. The book considers such topics as the presence of plants in the history of philosophy, the shifting status of plants in various traditions, what... more
This is the introduction to the edited volume 'Vegetal Entwinements in Philosophy and Art'. The book considers such topics as the presence of plants in the history of philosophy, the shifting status of plants in various traditions, what it means to make art with growing life-forms, and whether or not plants have moral standing. In an experimental vegetal arrangement, the reader presents some of the most influential writing on plants, philosophy, and the arts, together with provocative new contributions, as well as interviews with groundbreaking contemporary artists whose work has greatly enhanced our appreciation of vegetal being.
Please note that this is NOT the final proof that went into press, so some typos or other minor inaccuracies might be present.
Contributors:
Giovanni Aloi, Maria Theresa Alves, Marlene Atleo, Monica Bakke, Baracco + Wright, Emily Blackmer, Jodi Brandt, Teresa Castro, Dan Choffnes, Mark Dion, D. Denenge Duyst-Akpem, Braden Elliott, Monica Gagliano, Elaine Gan, Prudence Gibson, Manuela Infante, Luce Irigaray, Jonathon Keats, Zayaan Khan, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Eduardo Kohn, Wangari Maathai, Stefano Mancuso, Michael Marder, Nathalie Anguezomo Mba Bikoro, Elaine Miller, Samaneh Moafi, Uriel Orlow, Mark Payne, Allegra Pesenti, Špela Petrič, Michael Pollan, Darren Ranco, Nicholas J. Reo, Angela Roothaan, Marcela Salinas, Catriona A. H. Sandilands, Diana Scherer, Elisabeth E. Schussler, Vandana Shiva, Linda Tegg, Krista Tippet, Anthony Trewavas, Alessandra Viola, Eduardo Viveiros de Castro, James H. Wandersee, Lois Weinberger, Kyle Whyte, David Wood, Anicka Yi
Please note that this is NOT the final proof that went into press, so some typos or other minor inaccuracies might be present.
Contributors:
Giovanni Aloi, Maria Theresa Alves, Marlene Atleo, Monica Bakke, Baracco + Wright, Emily Blackmer, Jodi Brandt, Teresa Castro, Dan Choffnes, Mark Dion, D. Denenge Duyst-Akpem, Braden Elliott, Monica Gagliano, Elaine Gan, Prudence Gibson, Manuela Infante, Luce Irigaray, Jonathon Keats, Zayaan Khan, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Eduardo Kohn, Wangari Maathai, Stefano Mancuso, Michael Marder, Nathalie Anguezomo Mba Bikoro, Elaine Miller, Samaneh Moafi, Uriel Orlow, Mark Payne, Allegra Pesenti, Špela Petrič, Michael Pollan, Darren Ranco, Nicholas J. Reo, Angela Roothaan, Marcela Salinas, Catriona A. H. Sandilands, Diana Scherer, Elisabeth E. Schussler, Vandana Shiva, Linda Tegg, Krista Tippet, Anthony Trewavas, Alessandra Viola, Eduardo Viveiros de Castro, James H. Wandersee, Lois Weinberger, Kyle Whyte, David Wood, Anicka Yi
Research Interests:
Chapter #1 from 'Why Look at Plants? The Botanical Emergence in Contemporary Art' published by Brill, 2019. The essay deconstructs the aesthetic paradigms that have underpinned and perpetuated the separation of nature in culture through... more
Chapter #1 from 'Why Look at Plants? The Botanical Emergence in Contemporary Art' published by Brill, 2019. The essay deconstructs the aesthetic paradigms that have underpinned and perpetuated the separation of nature in culture through the representation of forests in Western art from the middle ages to today.
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An art historical genealogy mapping the emergence of new materialities in Western art from Cubism to Dada, and Surrealism to provide a sound context in which to theorize the presence of taxidermy in contemporary art.
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What is a plant portrait? How does it differ from the picture of a plant? About his painting 'Two Plants', Lucian Freud said: “They are lots of little portraits of leaves, lots and lots of them, starting with them rather robust in the... more
What is a plant portrait? How does it differ from the picture of a plant?
About his painting 'Two Plants', Lucian Freud said: “They are lots of little portraits of leaves, lots and lots of them, starting with them rather robust in the middle—greeny-blue and cream—and getting more yellow and broken”.
Drawing from the research for his book 'Lucian Freud Herbarium' (2019, Prestel) and informed by the exhibition 'Lucian Freud: Plant Portraits' which he guest curated for the Garden Museum in London, Aloi explores Freud’s ability to tease out the individual character of the plants he painted.
This is the main essay published in the exhibition catalog for the exhibition Lucian Freud: Plant Portraits held at the Garden Museum in London between October 13th 2023 and March 5th 2024. The catalog also features previously unpublished conversations with poet and artist Annie Freud and Freud's assistant David Dawson. Buy the catalog here: https://gardenmuseum.org.uk/product/catalogue-lucian-freud-plant-portraits/
About his painting 'Two Plants', Lucian Freud said: “They are lots of little portraits of leaves, lots and lots of them, starting with them rather robust in the middle—greeny-blue and cream—and getting more yellow and broken”.
Drawing from the research for his book 'Lucian Freud Herbarium' (2019, Prestel) and informed by the exhibition 'Lucian Freud: Plant Portraits' which he guest curated for the Garden Museum in London, Aloi explores Freud’s ability to tease out the individual character of the plants he painted.
This is the main essay published in the exhibition catalog for the exhibition Lucian Freud: Plant Portraits held at the Garden Museum in London between October 13th 2023 and March 5th 2024. The catalog also features previously unpublished conversations with poet and artist Annie Freud and Freud's assistant David Dawson. Buy the catalog here: https://gardenmuseum.org.uk/product/catalogue-lucian-freud-plant-portraits/
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A chapter from 'Why look at Plants? The Botanical Emergence in Contemporary Art', focuses on plants in contemporary art, the power relations established in the gallery space, and the representational pitfalls that these might entail.
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The co-authored introduction to 'Posthumanism in Art and Science: A Reader' published by Columbia University Press in 2021.
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PROMO DISCOUNT CODE: Purchase directly from Columbia University Press website with the code CUP20 to receive an instant 20% discount. http://cup.columbia.edu/book/posthumanism-in-art-and-science/9780231196673 Posthumanism synthesizes... more
PROMO DISCOUNT CODE: Purchase directly from Columbia University Press website with the code CUP20 to receive an instant 20% discount.
http://cup.columbia.edu/book/posthumanism-in-art-and-science/9780231196673
Posthumanism synthesizes philosophical, literary, and artistic responses to technological advancements, globalization, and mass extinction in the Anthropocene. It asks what it can mean to be human in an increasingly more-than-human world that has lost faith in the ideal of humanism, the autonomous, rational subject, and it models generative alternatives cognizant of the demands of social and ecological justice. Amid rising social justice movements, collapsing economic structures, and the dwindling power of cultural institutions, posthumanism advances thinking on new and previously unenvisionable challenges.
Posthumanism in Art and Science is an anthology of indispensable statements and artworks that provide an unprecedented mapping of this intellectual and aesthetic development in a global context. It features groundbreaking theorists including Donna Haraway, Rosi Braidotti, Mel Y. Chen, Michael Marder, Alexander Weheliye, Anna Tsing, Timothy Morton, N. Katherine Hayles, Bruno Latour, Francesca Ferrando, and Cary Wolfe, as well as innovative, influential artists and curators such as Yvonne Rainer, Skawennati, Chus Martínez, William Wegman, Nandipha Mntambo, Cassils, Pauline Oliveros, and Doo-sung Yoo. These provocative and compelling works, including previously unpublished interviews and essays, speak to the ongoing conceptual and political challenge of posthumanist thinking in a time of unprecedented cultural and environmental crises.
An essential primer and reference for educators, students, artists, and art enthusiasts, this volume offers a powerful framework for rethinking anthropocentric certitudes and reenvisioning equitable and sustainable futures.
http://cup.columbia.edu/book/posthumanism-in-art-and-science/9780231196673
Posthumanism synthesizes philosophical, literary, and artistic responses to technological advancements, globalization, and mass extinction in the Anthropocene. It asks what it can mean to be human in an increasingly more-than-human world that has lost faith in the ideal of humanism, the autonomous, rational subject, and it models generative alternatives cognizant of the demands of social and ecological justice. Amid rising social justice movements, collapsing economic structures, and the dwindling power of cultural institutions, posthumanism advances thinking on new and previously unenvisionable challenges.
Posthumanism in Art and Science is an anthology of indispensable statements and artworks that provide an unprecedented mapping of this intellectual and aesthetic development in a global context. It features groundbreaking theorists including Donna Haraway, Rosi Braidotti, Mel Y. Chen, Michael Marder, Alexander Weheliye, Anna Tsing, Timothy Morton, N. Katherine Hayles, Bruno Latour, Francesca Ferrando, and Cary Wolfe, as well as innovative, influential artists and curators such as Yvonne Rainer, Skawennati, Chus Martínez, William Wegman, Nandipha Mntambo, Cassils, Pauline Oliveros, and Doo-sung Yoo. These provocative and compelling works, including previously unpublished interviews and essays, speak to the ongoing conceptual and political challenge of posthumanist thinking in a time of unprecedented cultural and environmental crises.
An essential primer and reference for educators, students, artists, and art enthusiasts, this volume offers a powerful framework for rethinking anthropocentric certitudes and reenvisioning equitable and sustainable futures.
Research Interests:
Philosophy, Art History, Contemporary Art, Visual Culture, Animal Studies, and 10 moreCritical Animal Studies, Bioart, Art and Science, Natural History, Transhumanism/Posthumanism, Anthropocene, Critical Plant Studies, Culture and the Anthropocene, Science and Technology Studies, and Liberal Arts and Sciences
This book gathers the proceedings of the symposium held in September 2017 at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Botanical Speculations is the result of a year and half of research and preparation among faculty and students... more
This book gathers the proceedings of the symposium held in September 2017 at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Botanical Speculations is the result of a year and half of research and preparation among faculty and students attending undergraduate and graduate courses at the school. It emerged from shared interests for the botanical world among faculty and students and it paved the way for more non-human/posthuman/Anthropocene dialogues to unravel.
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Chapter 3, “Dioramas: Power, Realism, and Decorum” is a chapter from 'Speculative Taxidermy'.This chapter traces a genealogy of realism in art and natural history, problematizing the lifelike aesthetics of taxidermy and dioramas. The... more
Chapter 3, “Dioramas: Power, Realism, and Decorum” is a chapter from 'Speculative Taxidermy'.This chapter traces a genealogy of realism in art and natural history, problematizing the lifelike aesthetics of taxidermy and dioramas. The simultaneous emergence of photography and taxidermy as epistemic tools of natural history and science is in this context problem- atized by the discursive and technical parallelisms that led taxidermy to transcend the ethical-epistemic, mechanical objectivity of scientific epistemology in the nineteenth century. Thereby, notions of stillness, decorum, and ideology become central to a revisitation of Donna Haraway’s positioning of taxidermy as sedimentation of patriarchal discourses of imperialist conquest and subjugation. This chapter is bookended by Mark Dion’s anti-diorama Landfill (1999) and Oleg Kulik’s New Paradise Series (2000–2001). In different ways, both artists engage with forms of speculative aesthetics designed to address anthropogenic moments of crisis in relation to classical registers of realism.
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"Plant fixity, perceived passivity, and resilient silence have relegated the vegetal world to the cultural background of human civilization. This book argues that the recent emergence of plants in the gallery space constitutes a... more
"Plant fixity, perceived passivity, and resilient silence have relegated the vegetal world to the cultural background of human civilization. This book argues that the recent emergence of plants in the gallery space constitutes a wake-up-call to reappraise our relationship with plants at a time of deep ecological crisis. 'Why Look at Plants?' challenges readers’ pre-established notions through a diverse gathering of insights, stories, experiences, perspectives, and arguments encompassing multiple disciplines, media, and methodologies".
https://brill.com/view/title/33086
https://brill.com/view/title/33086
Research Interests:
Ground-breaking scientific research and new philosophical perspectives are challenging our anthropocentric cultural assumptions of the vegetal world. As humanity begins to grapple with the urgency imposed by climate change, reconsidering... more
Ground-breaking scientific research and new philosophical perspectives are challenging our anthropocentric cultural assumptions of the vegetal world.
As humanity begins to grapple with the urgency imposed by climate change, reconsidering human/plant relationships becomes essential to grant a sustainable future on this planet. It is in this context that a multifaceted approach to plant-life can reveal the importance of ecological interconnectedness and lead to a more nuanced consideration of the variety of living organisms and ecosystems with which we share the planet.
In Botanical Speculations, researchers, artists, art historians, and activists collaboratively map the uncharted territories of new forms of botanical knowledge. This book emerges from a symposium held at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in September 2017, and capitalizes on contemporary art’s ability to productively unhinge scientific theories and certainties in order to help us reconsider unquestioned beliefs about this living world
As humanity begins to grapple with the urgency imposed by climate change, reconsidering human/plant relationships becomes essential to grant a sustainable future on this planet. It is in this context that a multifaceted approach to plant-life can reveal the importance of ecological interconnectedness and lead to a more nuanced consideration of the variety of living organisms and ecosystems with which we share the planet.
In Botanical Speculations, researchers, artists, art historians, and activists collaboratively map the uncharted territories of new forms of botanical knowledge. This book emerges from a symposium held at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in September 2017, and capitalizes on contemporary art’s ability to productively unhinge scientific theories and certainties in order to help us reconsider unquestioned beliefs about this living world
Research Interests:
Animal: Exploring the Zoological World is a visually stunning and broad-ranging survey that explores and celebrates humankind's ongoing fascination with animals. Since our very first moments on Earth, we have been compelled to make images... more
Animal: Exploring the Zoological World is a visually stunning and broad-ranging survey that explores and celebrates humankind's ongoing fascination with animals. Since our very first moments on Earth, we have been compelled to make images of the curious beasts around us - whether as sources of food, danger, wonder, power, scientific significance or companionship. This carefully curated selection of images, chosen by an international panel of experts, delves into our shared past to tell the story of animal life.
From the first cave paintings, extraordinary medieval bestiaries and exquisite scientific illustration, to iconic paintings, contemporary artworks and the incredible technological advancements that will shape our futures together, the huge range of works reflects the beauty and variety of animals themselves - including butterflies, hummingbirds, bats, frogs, tigers, dogs, jellyfish, spiders and elephants, to name a few.
Arranged in a curated and thought-provoking sequence, this engaging compilation includes iconic works by some of the great names in zoology, such as Conrad Gesner, Charles Darwin and John James Audubon, as well as celebrated artists and photographers, indigenous cultures and lesser-known figures who have made important contributions to the study and representation of animals throughout history.
From the first cave paintings, extraordinary medieval bestiaries and exquisite scientific illustration, to iconic paintings, contemporary artworks and the incredible technological advancements that will shape our futures together, the huge range of works reflects the beauty and variety of animals themselves - including butterflies, hummingbirds, bats, frogs, tigers, dogs, jellyfish, spiders and elephants, to name a few.
Arranged in a curated and thought-provoking sequence, this engaging compilation includes iconic works by some of the great names in zoology, such as Conrad Gesner, Charles Darwin and John James Audubon, as well as celebrated artists and photographers, indigenous cultures and lesser-known figures who have made important contributions to the study and representation of animals throughout history.
Research Interests:
Free extract from my latest book! In 'Speculative Taxidermy', Aloi gives us a contact zone between humans and animality, art and the nonhuman. While there are a number of recent works on taxidermy, this is the book many of us have been... more
Free extract from my latest book!
In 'Speculative Taxidermy', Aloi gives us a contact zone between humans and animality, art and the nonhuman. While there are a number of recent works on taxidermy, this is the book many of us have been waiting for—broad-ranging, keen-eyed, insightful, and informed by animal studies as well as art history.
Ron Broglio, Arizona State University
In 'Speculative Taxidermy', Aloi gives us a contact zone between humans and animality, art and the nonhuman. While there are a number of recent works on taxidermy, this is the book many of us have been waiting for—broad-ranging, keen-eyed, insightful, and informed by animal studies as well as art history.
Ron Broglio, Arizona State University
Research Interests:
Giovanni Aloi and Caroline Picard are co-editing a new series for the University of Minnesota Press titled 'Art after Nature'. Currently accepting proposals. More info about the series and submission guidelines can be found here:... more
Giovanni Aloi and Caroline Picard are co-editing a new series for the University of Minnesota Press titled 'Art after Nature'. Currently accepting proposals. More info about the series and submission guidelines can be found here:
https://www.upress.umn.edu/…/announcing-a-new-series-art-af…
Thanks to everyone involved in making this happen!
'Art after Nature'
Editors: Giovanni Aloi and Caroline Picard
Art after Nature maps new aesthetic territories defined by the humanities' recent ontological turn. In the face of the unprecedented shifts in humanity's conceived relationship with the natural world, modes of critical and political artistic engagement are adapting in response. As notions of pristine sublimity crumble, Art after Nature proposes to explore the consequences of this transition, further destabilizing anthropocentrism, and revealing the dark ecological fluidity of naturecultures. The urgency imposed by anthropogenic lenses of inquiry provides an ethical focus capable of applying productive pressure on practices and discourses alike. Within this framework, art theory, practice, and criticism become intersecting platforms upon which to map current philosophical waves. Books published in this series engage with the politics and contradictions of the Anthropocene as a concept in order to problematize recent and influential philosophical waves like animal studies, posthumanism, and speculative realism in relation to art writing and art making.
https://www.upress.umn.edu/…/announcing-a-new-series-art-af…
Thanks to everyone involved in making this happen!
'Art after Nature'
Editors: Giovanni Aloi and Caroline Picard
Art after Nature maps new aesthetic territories defined by the humanities' recent ontological turn. In the face of the unprecedented shifts in humanity's conceived relationship with the natural world, modes of critical and political artistic engagement are adapting in response. As notions of pristine sublimity crumble, Art after Nature proposes to explore the consequences of this transition, further destabilizing anthropocentrism, and revealing the dark ecological fluidity of naturecultures. The urgency imposed by anthropogenic lenses of inquiry provides an ethical focus capable of applying productive pressure on practices and discourses alike. Within this framework, art theory, practice, and criticism become intersecting platforms upon which to map current philosophical waves. Books published in this series engage with the politics and contradictions of the Anthropocene as a concept in order to problematize recent and influential philosophical waves like animal studies, posthumanism, and speculative realism in relation to art writing and art making.
Research Interests:
Critical Theory, Visual Studies, Contemporary Art, Posthumanism, Visual Culture, and 18 moreCritical Posthumanism, Curating, Speculative Realism, Environmental Sustainability, Object Oriented Ontology, Conceptual Art, Animals in Culture, Visual Arts, Human-Animal Studies, Anthropocene studies, New Materialism, Anthropocene, New Materialisms, Curating contemporary art, Critical Plant Studies, Culture and the Anthropocene, Philosophy and Sociology of Human/animal Relations, and Art and the Anthropocene
" Throughout its history Antennae has been a cornucopia of sensuous seeing, writing, making, thinking, and reading, where nonhuman critters and people come together in terror and joy. Antennae 10 is replete with quirky, generative... more
" Throughout its history Antennae has been a cornucopia of sensuous seeing, writing, making, thinking, and reading, where nonhuman critters and people come together in terror and joy. Antennae 10 is replete with quirky, generative engagements with many of the most influential figures in the last 10 amazing years of irreverent, passionate, ethically brave, artfully innovative work for and with the critters of terra, living and dead. My hope for partial healing, even flourishing, for our damaged world lies in the contact zones of artists, activists, and critters. Antennae is such a contact zone. The politics demand the cultivation of the capacity to respond; the visual arts and the writing tune the mindsoulbody to care effectively outside the traps of human exceptionalism ".
DONNA HARAWAY
The essential collection of documents on Animal Studies, Posthumanism, and the Anthropocene in Contemporary art is available in print for a limited time only -- celebrating 10 years of 'Antennae: The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture' (www.antennae.org.uk)
Since 2007, Antennae: The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture has been the international reference point of the non-human turn in the visual arts. This volume gathers the richest interviews and the most thought-provoking essays featured over its forty installments thus far published-it captures the first ten years of a truly historic moment in contemporary art and philosophical thinking. The non-human turn, which has so pronouncedly characterized the cultural discourses of the new millennium, is most definitely going to shape the course of our troubled future with the planet. Featuring the voices and work of some of the most influential artists and scholars involved in the subject of the non-human and visual cultures, this collection is an unorthodox reference point, a verbatim account of the main ideas and movements, and an archive of original documents indispensable to tracing the intersections and origins of anthropogenic discourses. OUT NOW. THE BEST OF ANTENNAE'S FIRST 10 YEARS. ON PAPER. HARDBACK. FOR A LIMITED TIME ONLY
DONNA HARAWAY
The essential collection of documents on Animal Studies, Posthumanism, and the Anthropocene in Contemporary art is available in print for a limited time only -- celebrating 10 years of 'Antennae: The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture' (www.antennae.org.uk)
Since 2007, Antennae: The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture has been the international reference point of the non-human turn in the visual arts. This volume gathers the richest interviews and the most thought-provoking essays featured over its forty installments thus far published-it captures the first ten years of a truly historic moment in contemporary art and philosophical thinking. The non-human turn, which has so pronouncedly characterized the cultural discourses of the new millennium, is most definitely going to shape the course of our troubled future with the planet. Featuring the voices and work of some of the most influential artists and scholars involved in the subject of the non-human and visual cultures, this collection is an unorthodox reference point, a verbatim account of the main ideas and movements, and an archive of original documents indispensable to tracing the intersections and origins of anthropogenic discourses. OUT NOW. THE BEST OF ANTENNAE'S FIRST 10 YEARS. ON PAPER. HARDBACK. FOR A LIMITED TIME ONLY
Research Interests:
Entomology, Philosophy, Philosophy of Science, Contemporary Art, Posthumanism, and 12 moreAnimal Studies, Visual Cultures Of Science, Animals in Art, Speculative Realism, Animals & Society studies, Animals in Culture, Human-Animal Studies, Animals in Philosophy, Visual Cultures of Science (Visual Studies), Art of Botanical Illustration, Art and Nature, and Anthropocene
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A review of 'Speculative Taxidermy' in the 'Gothic Nature Journal'
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In "Lucian Freud Herbarium," a new book by the art historian Giovanni Aloi, the author offers an original analysis of this much-discussed painting, drawing out the full ambivalence of the relationship between man and pot plant. This is... more
In "Lucian Freud Herbarium," a new book by the art historian Giovanni Aloi, the author offers an original analysis of this much-discussed painting, drawing out the full ambivalence of the relationship between man and pot plant. This is one of many great readings in Aloi's thorough and abundantly illustrated survey of Freud's paintings of plants. As with all good scholarly works, the reader is left so convinced of the value of the subject matter that one is surprised it hasn't garnered more critical attention already.
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Why Look at Plants, winner of the 2019 Choice Outstanding Academic Title, is a deep dive into the arts and that broad, unruly swath of non-human life, the plant world.
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Giovanni Aloi in conversation with Professor Cecilia Nover (University of Otago) discusses key themes of Speculative Taxidermy.
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A web page collating the reviews of my recent book on Lucian Freud's paintings of plants.
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A review of Speculative Taxidermy published in Humanimalia by Dr. Stephanie Turner.
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Review of Speculative Taxidermy published in Journal of the History of Biology
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Review of Speculative Taxidermy in Critique d’art
Actualité internationale de la littérature critique sur l’art contemporain
Toutes les notes de lecture en ligne | 2018
Actualité internationale de la littérature critique sur l’art contemporain
Toutes les notes de lecture en ligne | 2018
Research Interests:
In the current issue of 'FMR' I talk about the portraits of cacti by Korean artist Kwang Ho-Lee. From the article: "The individuality of pets emerges from many factors. Our day-to-day closeness and recurring manifestation of desires and... more
In the current issue of 'FMR' I talk about the portraits of cacti by Korean artist Kwang Ho-Lee.
From the article: "The individuality of pets emerges from many factors. Our day-to-day closeness and recurring manifestation of desires and fears. Is the individual character of a plant indissolubly enmeshed with the time we spend looking at it? Should we look harder? If we looked at a cactus intensely enough, not to find beauty in a classic-gardening sense but to discern the traits that make the plant unique, what could we learn?
Lee’s paintings invite us to discover the identity and character of cacti—the heightened focus, the sustained attention to detail, the emphasis on nuances and idiosyncrasies. They remind us that most of the identity of a plant is superficial. Not in the sense that it is shallow, but that it resides on the surface of leaves, petals, and branches. In order to perceive it we need to retune our gaze and attention".
From the article: "The individuality of pets emerges from many factors. Our day-to-day closeness and recurring manifestation of desires and fears. Is the individual character of a plant indissolubly enmeshed with the time we spend looking at it? Should we look harder? If we looked at a cactus intensely enough, not to find beauty in a classic-gardening sense but to discern the traits that make the plant unique, what could we learn?
Lee’s paintings invite us to discover the identity and character of cacti—the heightened focus, the sustained attention to detail, the emphasis on nuances and idiosyncrasies. They remind us that most of the identity of a plant is superficial. Not in the sense that it is shallow, but that it resides on the surface of leaves, petals, and branches. In order to perceive it we need to retune our gaze and attention".
Research Interests:
An assessment of the ineffectiveness of environmental museum protests published in The Guardian on February 6th 2024. "Repetition is a complex phenomenon: it can deepen or hollow out experiences depending on how it is deployed. Repeated... more
An assessment of the ineffectiveness of environmental museum protests published in The Guardian on February 6th 2024. "Repetition is a complex phenomenon: it can deepen or hollow out experiences depending on how it is deployed. Repeated ad libitum anything shocking quickly becomes commonplace. The shock of the new quickly melts into the air".
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The last draft of a commissioned essay published in the exhibition catalog ‘Everybody Talks About the Weather’, edited by Dieter Roelstraete for the Fondazione Prada, pp.270-273 to accompany the exhibition by the same title. Venice... more
The last draft of a commissioned essay published in the exhibition catalog ‘Everybody Talks About the Weather’, edited by Dieter Roelstraete for the Fondazione Prada, pp.270-273 to accompany the exhibition by the same title. Venice 20.5-26.11, 2023
The article considers the layers of intertextuality involved in the environmentalist attack of the Laocoön that took place on August 18th, 2022.
The article considers the layers of intertextuality involved in the environmentalist attack of the Laocoön that took place on August 18th, 2022.
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The least celebrated plants in mainstream culture, those often despised as weeds, have recently become political symbols of resilience for marginalized and oppressed minority groups. Weeds are symbolically charged like no other category... more
The least celebrated plants in mainstream culture, those often despised as weeds, have recently become political symbols of resilience for marginalized and oppressed minority groups.
Weeds are symbolically charged like no other category of plants. It is because they are ontologically defined by the economies of human geographies that they have more recently infiltrated contemporary art. In our time, conflict is more than ever grounded in new conceptions of territory, invasion, and appropriation—quantities that are magnified and often distorted by social media. It is therefore not a surprise that the complex anthropomorphism that weeds inscribe powerfully resounds with the European migrant crisis, the marginalization of minority groups, waves of the diasporas in the Middle East, and issues of social injustice in the urban context, just to name a few. Therefore, in art a weed no longer is just “a plant out of place” but it embodies a radical kind of otherness. An uncelebrated symbol of resistance, the weed withstands capitalist forces by refusing to comply with aesthetic standards, geographic constriction, social hierarchies, and economic values. This article explores the resilience of weeds in contemporary art through the work of, among others, Jin Lee, Zachari Logan, Precious Okoyomon, Mona Caron, and Zheng Bo.
Weeds are symbolically charged like no other category of plants. It is because they are ontologically defined by the economies of human geographies that they have more recently infiltrated contemporary art. In our time, conflict is more than ever grounded in new conceptions of territory, invasion, and appropriation—quantities that are magnified and often distorted by social media. It is therefore not a surprise that the complex anthropomorphism that weeds inscribe powerfully resounds with the European migrant crisis, the marginalization of minority groups, waves of the diasporas in the Middle East, and issues of social injustice in the urban context, just to name a few. Therefore, in art a weed no longer is just “a plant out of place” but it embodies a radical kind of otherness. An uncelebrated symbol of resistance, the weed withstands capitalist forces by refusing to comply with aesthetic standards, geographic constriction, social hierarchies, and economic values. This article explores the resilience of weeds in contemporary art through the work of, among others, Jin Lee, Zachari Logan, Precious Okoyomon, Mona Caron, and Zheng Bo.
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What is a garden? This is the radical question posed by some of Lucian Freud's most original paintings. Unlike Stanley Spencer, who routinely painted plants and gardens, or even Cedric Morris, who introduced him to plants, Freud wasn't... more
What is a garden? This is the radical question posed by some of Lucian Freud's most original paintings. Unlike Stanley Spencer, who routinely painted plants and gardens, or even Cedric Morris, who introduced him to plants, Freud wasn't particularly interested in capturing the beauty of lush flower beds. Exception made for some very early works like Seaside Carden (1944) or the Henri Rousseau-reminiscent Botanical Carden painted soon thereafter, his interest veered from capturing manicured perfection or the full glory of summer blooms. In a sense, the very idea of a garden, as it is commonly conceived, represents the antithesis of his artistic philosophy. That's not to say that Freud didn't appreciate beauty of a classical kind. Like Annie Freud, poet and artist's first daughter told me, "He didn't like plants that were too overtly pretty or romantic. He had extreme tastes in gardens. It was either his own balcony, his back garden, or Drummond Castle Gardens".
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An experimental, speculative text about metamorphosis, miracles, and instincts.
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Art historians have greatly emphasized 4'33"'s deconstructive power and its conceptual root, often forgetting that the composer's intent also directly pointed at an early and all-important ecocritical message. As the artist explained in... more
Art historians have greatly emphasized 4'33"'s deconstructive power and its conceptual root, often forgetting that the composer's intent also directly pointed at an early and all-important ecocritical message. As the artist explained in an interview: “We live in a world where there are things as well as people. Trees, stones, water, everything is expressive... Life goes on very well without me, and that will explain to you my silent piece, 4’33”, which you may also have found unacceptable”. Determined to reposition the human within the soundscape of the natural, Cage noted that: "There’s no such thing as silence. You could hear the wind stirring outside during the first movement. During the second, raindrops began pattering the roof, and during the third people themselves made all kinds of interesting sounds as they talked or walked out”.
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Originally accepted by The Guardian with the title 'Cutting it close: art, the lawn, and climate change' and then published by them with the one above. The lawn—a quintessential feature in Western gardens and landscaping—is at the center... more
Originally accepted by The Guardian with the title 'Cutting it close: art, the lawn, and climate change' and then published by them with the one above.
The lawn—a quintessential feature in Western gardens and landscaping—is at the center of a climate change controversy. The high carbon footprint maintenance, its unquenchable thirst for fertilizers, weed killers and water, and the notorious unfriendliness towards all forms of wildlife have recently attracted mounting criticism and even spurred an anti-lawn movement in the US. Amidst the rise of concern for global warming and drier conditions, lawns are being converted to native meadows in the Midwest and to astroturf in the South and West Coast.
How did the lawn become such a cultural icon in the West? The unexpected answer lies in the 18th century paintings by John Constable, Antoine Watteau, Canaletto, Jon Varley, and a plethora of 19th century engravings that celebrated the opulent splendor of villas and mansions. It was artists, not just gardeners, who popularized the lawn and today they are determined to make us rethink our fixation with our notorious carpets of green.
This article maps the history of the lawn in art, beginning with its origin as a mark of aristocratic distinction in 17th century England and France, examining its ubiquitousness across suburban America, and ending with the work of contemporary artists who critically address the lawn and grass from critical and climate change-grounded perspectives like Lois Weinberger, Mel Chin, Martin Roth, Linda Tegg, Frances Whitehead, and Diana Scherer.
The lawn—a quintessential feature in Western gardens and landscaping—is at the center of a climate change controversy. The high carbon footprint maintenance, its unquenchable thirst for fertilizers, weed killers and water, and the notorious unfriendliness towards all forms of wildlife have recently attracted mounting criticism and even spurred an anti-lawn movement in the US. Amidst the rise of concern for global warming and drier conditions, lawns are being converted to native meadows in the Midwest and to astroturf in the South and West Coast.
How did the lawn become such a cultural icon in the West? The unexpected answer lies in the 18th century paintings by John Constable, Antoine Watteau, Canaletto, Jon Varley, and a plethora of 19th century engravings that celebrated the opulent splendor of villas and mansions. It was artists, not just gardeners, who popularized the lawn and today they are determined to make us rethink our fixation with our notorious carpets of green.
This article maps the history of the lawn in art, beginning with its origin as a mark of aristocratic distinction in 17th century England and France, examining its ubiquitousness across suburban America, and ending with the work of contemporary artists who critically address the lawn and grass from critical and climate change-grounded perspectives like Lois Weinberger, Mel Chin, Martin Roth, Linda Tegg, Frances Whitehead, and Diana Scherer.
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This article published in 'Flash Art' traces a succinct history of posthumanism in art to provide readers with important reference points that explain the meaning of recurring aesthetics across the works exhibited at the Venice Biennale... more
This article published in 'Flash Art' traces a succinct history of posthumanism in art to provide readers with important reference points that explain the meaning of recurring aesthetics across the works exhibited at the Venice Biennale of 2022.
Cecilia Alemani has curated a “Posthuman Biennale”, so the worldwide press reports. The New York-based curator used the term posthuman at the opening press conference and also gave Rosi Braidotti—the posthuman Italian pioneer—a special mention. While to art audiences, posthumanism might sound new and cutting edge, or even outright mysterious—the latest trend in a post-COVID world that’s lost faith in itself—the posthuman revolution has been causing a stir in academia for over 40 years and its roots reach far deeper into 1960s western philosophy and early modern art.
Cecilia Alemani has curated a “Posthuman Biennale”, so the worldwide press reports. The New York-based curator used the term posthuman at the opening press conference and also gave Rosi Braidotti—the posthuman Italian pioneer—a special mention. While to art audiences, posthumanism might sound new and cutting edge, or even outright mysterious—the latest trend in a post-COVID world that’s lost faith in itself—the posthuman revolution has been causing a stir in academia for over 40 years and its roots reach far deeper into 1960s western philosophy and early modern art.
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Conversation between curators Giovanni Aloi and Andrew Yang on Earthly Observatory -- exhibition at SAIC galleries, Chicago -- Aug.31st -- Dec 3rd 2021. Earthly Observatory explores how we sense, portray, and engage our deep planetary... more
Conversation between curators Giovanni Aloi and Andrew Yang on Earthly Observatory -- exhibition at SAIC galleries, Chicago -- Aug.31st -- Dec 3rd 2021.
Earthly Observatory explores how we sense, portray, and engage our deep planetary entanglements. Through crafted visions, close listening, and histories of conquest and protest, the exhibition examines the contested relations of ecology to economy, aesthetics to ethics that dominate our experience at one moment, and evades awareness in the next. Drawn from diverse practices across art, design, and the natural sciences, the works invite us to question the ways that we—as one among many earthlings—create our understanding of a manifold world.
Earthly Observatory explores how we sense, portray, and engage our deep planetary entanglements. Through crafted visions, close listening, and histories of conquest and protest, the exhibition examines the contested relations of ecology to economy, aesthetics to ethics that dominate our experience at one moment, and evades awareness in the next. Drawn from diverse practices across art, design, and the natural sciences, the works invite us to question the ways that we—as one among many earthlings—create our understanding of a manifold world.
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Dawoud Bey: Constructing Nature, Decolonizing Landscape Inspired by the work of African American photographer Roy DeCarava and the poetry of Langston Hughes, Dawoud Bey’s Night Coming Tenderly Black series provides a blueprint for the... more
Dawoud Bey: Constructing Nature, Decolonizing Landscape
Inspired by the work of African American photographer Roy DeCarava and the poetry of Langston Hughes, Dawoud Bey’s Night Coming Tenderly Black series provides a blueprint for the kind of political art our time truly needs. The series of darkened gelatine silver prints visualizes the Underground Railroad – a network of safe houses and locations across the Cleveland and Hudson, Ohio landscapes in which fugitive slaves could find shelter on their way towards Lake Erie and the final fifty-mile passage to freedom in Canada.
Leaving people entirely out of the picture, Bey makes his political statement through images of an often eerie and ambiguous American landscape at twilight. Across the series, non-affirmative aesthetics are entrusted with the task of revealing the inherent white supremacist power-structures that have defined three hundred years of European and American landscape painting.
Inspired by the work of African American photographer Roy DeCarava and the poetry of Langston Hughes, Dawoud Bey’s Night Coming Tenderly Black series provides a blueprint for the kind of political art our time truly needs. The series of darkened gelatine silver prints visualizes the Underground Railroad – a network of safe houses and locations across the Cleveland and Hudson, Ohio landscapes in which fugitive slaves could find shelter on their way towards Lake Erie and the final fifty-mile passage to freedom in Canada.
Leaving people entirely out of the picture, Bey makes his political statement through images of an often eerie and ambiguous American landscape at twilight. Across the series, non-affirmative aesthetics are entrusted with the task of revealing the inherent white supremacist power-structures that have defined three hundred years of European and American landscape painting.
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The article links our cultural snobbery for plants in art to wholly indefensible gender and social biases that still today impact our conceptions of the natural world. Art institutions are now rushing to acknowledge the threat of the... more
The article links our cultural snobbery for plants in art to wholly indefensible gender and social biases that still today impact our conceptions of the natural world. Art institutions are now rushing to acknowledge the threat of the climate crisis, but in truth, the writing has been on the wall – or shall we say on the canvas – for the past 500 years. Why have over a hundred paintings of plants by one of the most famous artists in the world been overlooked by critics, curators, and art historians? Our lack of regard for plants and animals in art is indicative of our lack of appreciation for nature itself. The current climate emergency is surely linked to this longstanding cultural attitude.
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The Routledge Handbook of Human-Animal Studies presents a collection of original essays from artists and scholars who have established themselves internationally on the basis of specific and significant new contributions to human-animal... more
The Routledge Handbook of Human-Animal Studies presents a collection of original essays from artists and scholars who have established themselves internationally on the basis of specific and significant new contributions to human-animal studies. It offers a broad interpretive account of the development and present configurations of the field of human-animal studies across many cultures, continents, and times.
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Through the disentangling of the dichotomic opposition of nature and culture proposed by Donna Haraway, the vision of boundary-breakdown between animal, human, and machine is surprisingly guilty of a conspicuous omission: plants.... more
Through the disentangling of the dichotomic opposition of nature and culture proposed by Donna Haraway, the vision of boundary-breakdown between animal, human, and machine is surprisingly guilty of a conspicuous omission: plants. Frequently studied for their medical properties and consistently exploited for their aesthetic, edible and
malleable qualities, plants have played a defining role in the historical and cultural development of humankind. Why have plants been ignored in the outlining of the cyborgian reconfiguration? To this point, plants have been silent witnesses of the animal revolution in the humanities and the arts. However, through the subjects of hybridity
and interspecies communication they have come to occupy a more prominent place in the posthumanist discourse. Recent advances in plant molecular biology, cellular biology, electrophysiology and ecology, have revealed plants as sensory and communicative organisms, characterized by active, problem-solving behavior.
Text by Giovanni Aloi
malleable qualities, plants have played a defining role in the historical and cultural development of humankind. Why have plants been ignored in the outlining of the cyborgian reconfiguration? To this point, plants have been silent witnesses of the animal revolution in the humanities and the arts. However, through the subjects of hybridity
and interspecies communication they have come to occupy a more prominent place in the posthumanist discourse. Recent advances in plant molecular biology, cellular biology, electrophysiology and ecology, have revealed plants as sensory and communicative organisms, characterized by active, problem-solving behavior.
Text by Giovanni Aloi
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An essay on the use of taxidermy objects in Roger Brown's work -- from ‘Roger Brown: Taxidermy and the Abyss of Representation’ in Roger Brown: Virtual Still Lifes’ (New York and Chicago: Museum of Arts and Design) pp. 44-47
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An essay exploring the work of artist Zachari Logan for the catalog of his exhibition at New Art Project, London. The theme of the "Wildman", a mythical and autobiographical figure central to this series, invites a revisitation of Suzi... more
An essay exploring the work of artist Zachari Logan for the catalog of his exhibition at New Art Project, London. The theme of the "Wildman", a mythical and autobiographical figure central to this series, invites a revisitation of Suzi Gablik's 'Re-Enchantment of Art' in the context of the current climate emergency. How can art help us relate to nature beyond the optics of scientific knowledge?
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Not everything is wrong with the idea of botanical decolonisation: science tells us that biodiversity is generally good for ecosystems. But I argue that we need to think harder, longer and in more complex ways about the chains of... more
Not everything is wrong with the idea of botanical decolonisation: science tells us that biodiversity is generally good for ecosystems. But I argue that we need to think harder, longer and in more complex ways about the chains of inference linking our thinking – from plants to animals, peoples, and territories and starting from the meaning and agency of the word “native”. This paper explores the current debate, critically addresses the idea of decolonization in the garden, and untangles the biological and symbolic threads that complicate the ways we think about plants in our backyard.
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This essay focuses on the role played by symbolism in the representation of animals in art. It investigates the intrinsic relations between anthropocentrism and objectification and how contemporary artists subvert the power of classical... more
This essay focuses on the role played by symbolism in the representation of animals in art. It investigates the intrinsic relations between anthropocentrism and objectification and how contemporary artists subvert the power of classical symbolism in order to rethink our relationship with animals.
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Actively involved in the academic field of human-animal studies for the past fifteen years, Giovanni Aloi has challenged the representational tropes that relentlessly objectify animals in art. His thought-provoking first book, Art &... more
Actively involved in the academic field of human-animal studies for the past fifteen years, Giovanni Aloi has challenged the representational tropes that relentlessly objectify animals in art. His thought-provoking first book, Art & Animals, considers the moral and ethical implications of using animals, dead or alive, in contemporary art practices. Aloi is a lecturer in visual culture at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and the founder
and editor-in-chief of Antennae: The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture, a peer-reviewed journal dedicated to the subject of nature in contemporary art.
and editor-in-chief of Antennae: The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture, a peer-reviewed journal dedicated to the subject of nature in contemporary art.
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An article about Damien Hirst's butterfly paintings and the hypocritical responses they attract from a community of art historians who don't seem to know what art materials are actually made of.
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The past twenty years have seen a spike in the interest in art and science collaborations. Partly because of the resonance of the posthuman cyborg in the ontological turn; partly because of the rise of BioArt; perhaps because of the... more
The past twenty years have seen a spike in the interest in art and science collaborations. Partly because of the resonance of the posthuman cyborg in the ontological turn; partly because of the rise of BioArt; perhaps because of the prominence that multidisciplinarity has acquired in academia; and surely in light of our fraught relationship with our environment and climate change, the intersections of art and science have recently become more complexly defined by new ethics, politics, aesthetics, and poetics.
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Historical and visual culture research methods can be used to identify the complex symbolism assigned to plants in public urban spaces. This symbolism can divide opinion and generate heated debate on what is considered to be native,... more
Historical and visual culture research methods can be used to identify the complex symbolism assigned to plants in public urban spaces. This symbolism can divide opinion and generate heated debate on what is considered to be native, other, and culturally and aesthetically appropriate. This article is a contribution to the emerging field of critical plant studies, examining events in Italy when exotic plants were installed in a public square. The work encompasses elements of environmental, anthropological, architectural, and art historical studies, to reveal important aspects of our relationship with plants, other people, and our past and future histories.
The last few years have been characterized by dramatic sociocultural events: from Brexit to Trump's election in the USA; the unthinkable has manifested itself as the index of insidious and undervalued ideological networks. Despite the bleak outlook, the deep sense of moral loss, and ethical disorientation, these events could function as an opportunity to productively think beyond the fictitious righteousness of post-modern politics. In the middle of a cold night, in February 2017, Starbucks Coffee Co., in collaboration with Italian architect Marco Bay, installed a grove of palm and banana trees opposite Milan's much-loved gothic cathedral. Public opinion instantly split. Milan's rude awakening revealed a tale of two cities: on one side were those who lauded the initiative and on the opposite were those who condemned the trees' exotic origin as unrepresentative of true Italianicity. Against the backdrop of strained relationships between Italy and the European Union, due to the handling of North-African and Middle-Eastern diasporas, palms and bananas have found themselves at the center of an unexpectedly acrimonious public discussion. This article considers the role played by plant-politics and architectural aesthetics in constructing national identity and otherness while tapping into all-important and often concealed aspects of contemporary society's collective unconscious.
K E Y W O R D S architecture, banana tree, diaspora, exotic plants, gothic style, identity, Italy, national, palm tree
The last few years have been characterized by dramatic sociocultural events: from Brexit to Trump's election in the USA; the unthinkable has manifested itself as the index of insidious and undervalued ideological networks. Despite the bleak outlook, the deep sense of moral loss, and ethical disorientation, these events could function as an opportunity to productively think beyond the fictitious righteousness of post-modern politics. In the middle of a cold night, in February 2017, Starbucks Coffee Co., in collaboration with Italian architect Marco Bay, installed a grove of palm and banana trees opposite Milan's much-loved gothic cathedral. Public opinion instantly split. Milan's rude awakening revealed a tale of two cities: on one side were those who lauded the initiative and on the opposite were those who condemned the trees' exotic origin as unrepresentative of true Italianicity. Against the backdrop of strained relationships between Italy and the European Union, due to the handling of North-African and Middle-Eastern diasporas, palms and bananas have found themselves at the center of an unexpectedly acrimonious public discussion. This article considers the role played by plant-politics and architectural aesthetics in constructing national identity and otherness while tapping into all-important and often concealed aspects of contemporary society's collective unconscious.
K E Y W O R D S architecture, banana tree, diaspora, exotic plants, gothic style, identity, Italy, national, palm tree
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The anti-anthropocentric, revisionist and multidisciplinary approaches of animal-studies have proved largely productive in rethinking human-animal relationships and in challenging the representational tropes that have relentlessly... more
The anti-anthropocentric, revisionist and multidisciplinary approaches of animal-studies have proved largely productive in rethinking human-animal relationships and in challenging the representational tropes that have relentlessly objectified animals in art, as well as other disciplines. However, this first revisionist wave was marked by a pronounced focus on mammals -- the indirect reflection of a persistent anthropocentric tendency within the movement that claimed to rid the humanities from its anthropocentric ways.
The recent speculative turn in philosophy, including the rise of
new materialism, object oriented ontology, and critical plant studies have confirmed my doubts to be well-founded: the zoocentrism that still characterizes human-animal studies requires serious
problematization.
(Originally published in Antennae, issue 37, 2016, p.5-22)
The recent speculative turn in philosophy, including the rise of
new materialism, object oriented ontology, and critical plant studies have confirmed my doubts to be well-founded: the zoocentrism that still characterizes human-animal studies requires serious
problematization.
(Originally published in Antennae, issue 37, 2016, p.5-22)
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In one of my earliest conversations with Giovanni Aloi, he described the problem of being a plant studies person at an animal studies conference: by entertaining the subjectivity of plants, any moral high ground previously associated with... more
In one of my earliest conversations with Giovanni Aloi, he described the problem of being a plant studies person at an animal studies conference: by entertaining the subjectivity of plants, any moral high ground previously associated with vegetarianism/veganism get a little complicated. Undaunted, Aloi explores the mess of that new territory, tracing their appearance in contemporary art and art history. He is the Founding Editor of Antennae, a Journal of Nature in Visual Culture, teaches at The School of the Art Institute, works for Sotheby’s Institute of Art, moonlights as an art expert on the BBC, and is on the verge of finishing two books on taxidermy and art, and plants and art.
http://badatsports.com/2016/conceptions-of-plant-life-an-interview-with-giovanni-aloi/
http://badatsports.com/2016/conceptions-of-plant-life-an-interview-with-giovanni-aloi/
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With the publication of an extended editorial titled 'Animal Studies and Art: Elephants in the Room' by Giovanni Aloi, Editor in Chief of 'Antennae', the journal embarks on a new and challenging year-long project constituting somewhat of... more
With the publication of an extended editorial titled 'Animal Studies and Art: Elephants in the Room' by Giovanni Aloi, Editor in Chief of 'Antennae', the journal embarks on a new and challenging year-long project constituting somewhat of a departure from the theoretical approaches of animal studies for the purpose of conceiving new productivities specific to art. This project is provocatively titled 'Beyond Animal Studies'.
At the end of March 2015 the publication of two installments dedicated to multispecies-Intra-action: new ways of thinking multispecies aesthetics through Karen Barad’s agential realism (co-edited with artist/curator Madeleine Boyd) will mark the beginning of this journey. This first offering will be followed by an issue edited by artists and theorists Suzanne Anker and Sabine Flach focusing on the proceedings of an exciting conference dedicated to bioart titled 'Naturally Hypernatural' that took place in New York (November 2014). The last segment of this publishing project will comprise two issues on art and environment that will be made available in December 2015 and March 2016.
'Animal Studies and Art: Elephants in the Room’ is the developed and expanded version of the keynote address Giovanni Aloi gave at the University of Wurzburg in autumn 2014. Its content stems from a genuine sense of concern with regards to current affairs in animal studies, its involvement with contemporary art, and the challenges scholars and artists face in engaging with multidisciplinarity within this context.
At the end of March 2015 the publication of two installments dedicated to multispecies-Intra-action: new ways of thinking multispecies aesthetics through Karen Barad’s agential realism (co-edited with artist/curator Madeleine Boyd) will mark the beginning of this journey. This first offering will be followed by an issue edited by artists and theorists Suzanne Anker and Sabine Flach focusing on the proceedings of an exciting conference dedicated to bioart titled 'Naturally Hypernatural' that took place in New York (November 2014). The last segment of this publishing project will comprise two issues on art and environment that will be made available in December 2015 and March 2016.
'Animal Studies and Art: Elephants in the Room’ is the developed and expanded version of the keynote address Giovanni Aloi gave at the University of Wurzburg in autumn 2014. Its content stems from a genuine sense of concern with regards to current affairs in animal studies, its involvement with contemporary art, and the challenges scholars and artists face in engaging with multidisciplinarity within this context.
Research Interests:
Art History, Posthumanism, Natural History, Animal Rights/Liberation, History of Art, and 7 moreHuman-Animal Studies, Animal Rights, Butterflies, Multispecies Ethnography, Damien Hirst, Art and Art History, and Animal Rights, Animal Ecology, Animal Studies, Animal Ethics, Animal Cognition, Animal Liberation, Animals in Culture, Philosophy Of Animals, Animals & Society studies, Ethics of Animals, and Laboratory Animal Welfare, Animal Law
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The first in a trilogy -- 'Earthly Surfacing' focuses on questions of epistemology and representation of the land. Seen by who? Seen how—through which institutional or other lenses? Represented with what materials? Rejecting or embracing... more
The first in a trilogy -- 'Earthly Surfacing' focuses on questions of epistemology and representation of the land. Seen by who? Seen how—through which institutional or other lenses? Represented with what materials? Rejecting or embracing the aesthetics of whose ideological traditions and cultures?
This issue features contributions by:
Janine Antoni | Diane Burko | Thomas Busciglio-Ritter | Sophie Chao | Assaf Evron | Shambhobi Ghosh | James Kelly | Victoria King | Lisa Le Feuvre | Laura Malacart | Joey Orr | Cindy Qiao | Miriam Seidel | Frances Whitehead | Derrick Woods-Morrow
Front cover image: Janie Morgan Petyarre, 'Bush Orange Dreaming',1998, Utopia, 59 x 45 cm, acrylic on canvas
This issue features contributions by:
Janine Antoni | Diane Burko | Thomas Busciglio-Ritter | Sophie Chao | Assaf Evron | Shambhobi Ghosh | James Kelly | Victoria King | Lisa Le Feuvre | Laura Malacart | Joey Orr | Cindy Qiao | Miriam Seidel | Frances Whitehead | Derrick Woods-Morrow
Front cover image: Janie Morgan Petyarre, 'Bush Orange Dreaming',1998, Utopia, 59 x 45 cm, acrylic on canvas
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This issue of Antennae, co-edited by Ken Rinaldo and Giovanni Aloi and titled ‘Microbial Ecologies’ offers a timely range of multidisciplinary practices, approaches, methodologies, and conceptions to help us see and value the microbial... more
This issue of Antennae, co-edited by Ken Rinaldo and Giovanni Aloi and titled ‘Microbial Ecologies’ offers a timely range of multidisciplinary practices, approaches, methodologies, and conceptions to help us see and value the microbial worlds that until recently have remained invisible. It is co-edited with Ken Rinaldo—an artist internationally recognized for interactive art installations developing hybrid ecologies with animals, algorithms, plants, and bacterial cultures. His art/science practice serves as a platform for hacking complex social, biological, and machine symbionts. Inventing and constructing techno interfaces allows for illuminating and amplifying the underlying beauty, and intertwined symbiosis existent in natural living systems.
It is only by recognizing and engaging with microbial agencies that fuller networks of interconnectedness will enable us to tell the stories we truly need for our time and for the future.
It is only by recognizing and engaging with microbial agencies that fuller networks of interconnectedness will enable us to tell the stories we truly need for our time and for the future.
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This issue of Antennae features the work of many scholars, researchers, and artists who have accomplished just that by harnessing the world-forming power of empathy and imagination in order to make visible what has for too long been made... more
This issue of Antennae features the work of many scholars, researchers, and artists who have accomplished just that by harnessing the world-forming power of empathy and imagination in order to make visible what has for too long been made invisible. Over time, they have devised new and much-needed thinking structures that can reconnect us with the ecosystems and ecologies we share with other earthlings.
Featuring contributions by:
Rachel Armstrong / Suzette Bousema / Eli Brown / Yama Chiodi / John Dao-Tran / Darcie DeAngelo / doxiadis+ / Madge Evers / Annike Flo / Michael J. Hathaway / Allison Kotzig / Laurel V. McLaughlin / Elspeth Mitchell / Marion Neumann / Dao Nguyen / Peter McCoy / Regine Rapp / Merlin Sheldrake / Galina Shevchenko / Remi Siciliano / Mendel Skulski / Kuai Shen / Fereshteh Toosi / Lenka Vráblíková / Helena Wee
Featuring contributions by:
Rachel Armstrong / Suzette Bousema / Eli Brown / Yama Chiodi / John Dao-Tran / Darcie DeAngelo / doxiadis+ / Madge Evers / Annike Flo / Michael J. Hathaway / Allison Kotzig / Laurel V. McLaughlin / Elspeth Mitchell / Marion Neumann / Dao Nguyen / Peter McCoy / Regine Rapp / Merlin Sheldrake / Galina Shevchenko / Remi Siciliano / Mendel Skulski / Kuai Shen / Fereshteh Toosi / Lenka Vráblíková / Helena Wee
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Posthumanist discourses, and subsequently conceptions of the Anthropocene, have been substantially shaped by implicitly unacknowledged structural omissions. A foundation level endemic confusion of the specific with the universal... more
Posthumanist discourses, and subsequently conceptions of the Anthropocene, have been substantially shaped by implicitly unacknowledged structural omissions. A foundation level endemic confusion of the specific with the universal critically compromises any anticipated radical paradigm shifts to, as philosopher Sylvia Wynter (2015) would have it, “give humanness a different future”. Again, according to Wynter, it is important that we urgently shift the hollow universalizing terms that obscure the subjective positions of the “we” at the center of popular Anthropocene discourse. This reference point “is not the referent-we of the human species itself", a fungible planetary human figure, but rather a culturally discreet Human (or Human®™) with specific anthropogenic activities and relations, both structurally and conceptually.
Which new conceptions of the Anthropocene may arise when geographical time collapses with historical time? What new thoughts on the Anthropocene can be revealed when we acknowledge that neither the responsibility nor the vulnerability of climate change, are evenly/universally distributed? How do we disrupt the narratives of the Anthropocene(s) that erase the roles and realities of the non-Human®™? This issue of Antennae is co-edited with Betelhem Makonnen.
With contributions by:
Hiba Ali / Ilknur Demirkoparan / Dalaeja Foreman / Clareese Hill
Ariel René Jackson /Esther F. Jansen / Vuslat D. Katsanis / Mirela Kulović / Betelhem Makonnen / Katherine McKittrick / Stephanie Polsky / Joshua Williams / Kathryn Yusoff / mukhtara yusuf
Which new conceptions of the Anthropocene may arise when geographical time collapses with historical time? What new thoughts on the Anthropocene can be revealed when we acknowledge that neither the responsibility nor the vulnerability of climate change, are evenly/universally distributed? How do we disrupt the narratives of the Anthropocene(s) that erase the roles and realities of the non-Human®™? This issue of Antennae is co-edited with Betelhem Makonnen.
With contributions by:
Hiba Ali / Ilknur Demirkoparan / Dalaeja Foreman / Clareese Hill
Ariel René Jackson /Esther F. Jansen / Vuslat D. Katsanis / Mirela Kulović / Betelhem Makonnen / Katherine McKittrick / Stephanie Polsky / Joshua Williams / Kathryn Yusoff / mukhtara yusuf
Research Interests:
Art History, Black/African Diaspora, Contemporary Art, Posthumanism, Visual Culture, and 11 moreCritical Animal Studies, History of Slavery, Colonialism, Ecology, Black Power, Black Women's Studies, Transhumanism/Posthumanism, Decolonial Thought, Black Masculinity, Critical Plant Studies, and Black Lives Matter
Interconnectivity, collaborative organisms, new environmental paradigms-over the past ten years Queer Ecologies has mined the foundations of arts and humanities discourses in the knowledge that fairer and more sustainable futures can't be... more
Interconnectivity, collaborative organisms, new environmental paradigms-over the past ten years Queer Ecologies has mined the foundations of arts and humanities discourses in the knowledge that fairer and more sustainable futures can't be built on the legacy of technocapitalist, anthropocentric, cisgender models. More than ever before, trans and gender non-conformist perspectives, ecofeminist theories, environmental justice movements, disabilities studies, and LGBTQIA+ geographies, only to name a few, have bravely pushed epistemological boundaries while empowering those of us who have been routinely marginalized, erased, and prosecuted by governments and institutions around the world.
Research Interests:
This issue of Antennae titled ‘Spaces and Species’, aims, in the words of co-editors Linda Tegg, Mauro Baracco and Louise Wright, to “ask architecture to reframe what it does best – to make careful relationships between things – this... more
This issue of Antennae titled ‘Spaces and Species’, aims, in the words of co-editors Linda Tegg, Mauro Baracco and Louise Wright, to “ask architecture to reframe what it does best – to make careful relationships between things – this time with other species. The observation this requires – reflected in this issue – is aligned to practices of listening over processes of objectification as a precursor to acting with. We seek more diplomatic ways to conduct ourselves in the shared environment to find the gestures and patterns of living that enable us to follow those we live amongst”. Ar- architecture has for thousands of years mediated our relationship with the nonhuman and the land. Delimiting, separating, excluding, and isolating—at times architectural structures have implicitly reinforced the nature/culture dichotomy that has not only defined our daily activities but that has shaped our anthropocentric conception. This issue of Antennae features the contributions of artists, architects, and scholars whose practices help us to re-envision our relationship with the spaces and species that make up the interconnected world we live in.
Research Interests:
Some considerations on urban ecosystems in Milan, Italy based on the not-so-sustainable architectural innovations of Bosco Verticale.
Research Interests:
Antennae Issue #54 - Uncontainable Natures Vol.1 is out! Download free at www.antennae.org.uk Co-edited by Kevin Chua, Lucy Davis, and Nora Taylor the issue ‘Uncontainable Natures’ "gathers artistic contributions, interviews, fiction, and... more
Antennae Issue #54 - Uncontainable Natures Vol.1 is out! Download free at www.antennae.org.uk
Co-edited by Kevin Chua, Lucy Davis, and Nora Taylor the issue ‘Uncontainable Natures’ "gathers artistic contributions, interviews, fiction, and academic essays that contest the ex- tractive regimes and logics of containment that have re-emerged in Southeast Asia since the 1970s in which a recursion of colonialism has brought an evacuated and homogenised image of nature in tow".
The diversity, wealth, and breadth of content and perspectives gathered across the two volumes (the second will be published next month) outline myriad opportunities to rethink the foundations of our practices as well as reconsider the directions of our inquiries. It is our hope that the contributions featured in the two volumes will become staples in syllabi across the arts and humanities and that they will inform the practices of scholars and artists alike for years to come.
Featuring the contributions of:
Yu-Mei Balasingamchow
Nils Bubandt
Sharon Chin
Kevin Chua
Agnieszka Cieszanowska
Graiwoot Chulphongsathorn
Lucy Davis
Ng Huiying
Faisal Husni
May Adadol Ingawanij
Michelle Lai
Philippa Lovatt
MAP Office [Gutierrez + Portefaix]
Vipash Purichanont
Trương Minh Quý
Marietta Radomska
Stéphane Rennesson
Marian Pastor Roces
Alfian Sa’at
Zedeck Siew
Sutthirat Supaparinya
Adele Tan
Nora Taylor
Nguyễn Trinh Thi
Anna Tsing
Harriet Rabe von Froreich
As always, I’d like to thank everyone involved in the making of this issue — from the wonderful co-editors and contributors to those who generously lent their time to peer review, proofread, and assist along the way.
Front cover image: MAPOffice, GhostIsland, C-Print, 160x120cm, 2018 © MAPOffice
Co-edited by Kevin Chua, Lucy Davis, and Nora Taylor the issue ‘Uncontainable Natures’ "gathers artistic contributions, interviews, fiction, and academic essays that contest the ex- tractive regimes and logics of containment that have re-emerged in Southeast Asia since the 1970s in which a recursion of colonialism has brought an evacuated and homogenised image of nature in tow".
The diversity, wealth, and breadth of content and perspectives gathered across the two volumes (the second will be published next month) outline myriad opportunities to rethink the foundations of our practices as well as reconsider the directions of our inquiries. It is our hope that the contributions featured in the two volumes will become staples in syllabi across the arts and humanities and that they will inform the practices of scholars and artists alike for years to come.
Featuring the contributions of:
Yu-Mei Balasingamchow
Nils Bubandt
Sharon Chin
Kevin Chua
Agnieszka Cieszanowska
Graiwoot Chulphongsathorn
Lucy Davis
Ng Huiying
Faisal Husni
May Adadol Ingawanij
Michelle Lai
Philippa Lovatt
MAP Office [Gutierrez + Portefaix]
Vipash Purichanont
Trương Minh Quý
Marietta Radomska
Stéphane Rennesson
Marian Pastor Roces
Alfian Sa’at
Zedeck Siew
Sutthirat Supaparinya
Adele Tan
Nora Taylor
Nguyễn Trinh Thi
Anna Tsing
Harriet Rabe von Froreich
As always, I’d like to thank everyone involved in the making of this issue — from the wonderful co-editors and contributors to those who generously lent their time to peer review, proofread, and assist along the way.
Front cover image: MAPOffice, GhostIsland, C-Print, 160x120cm, 2018 © MAPOffice
Research Interests:
Antennae Issue #55 - Uncontainable Natures Vol.2 is out! Download free, along with Vol.1, at www.antennae.org.uk Co-edited by Kevin Chua, Lucy Davis, and Nora Taylor the issue ‘Uncontainable Natures’ "gathers artistic contributions,... more
Antennae Issue #55 - Uncontainable Natures Vol.2 is out! Download free, along with Vol.1, at www.antennae.org.uk
Co-edited by Kevin Chua, Lucy Davis, and Nora Taylor the issue ‘Uncontainable Natures’ "gathers artistic contributions, interviews, fiction, and academic essays that contest the ex- tractive regimes and logics of containment that have re-emerged in Southeast Asia since the 1970s in which a recursion of colonialism has brought an evacuated and homogenised image of nature in tow".
The diversity, wealth, and breadth of content and perspectives gathered across the two volumes outline myriad opportunities to rethink the foundations of our practices as well as reconsider the directions of our inquiries. It is our hope that the contributions featured in the two volumes will become staples in syllabi across the arts and humanities and that they will inform the practices of scholars and artists alike for years to come.
Featuring contributions by
Jose Santos P. Ardivilla
Martin Bartelmus
Kevin Chua
Lucy Davis
Darcie DeAngelo
Pujita Guha
Garima Gupta
James Jack
Soumya James
Ayesha Keshani
Art Labor
Nguyễn Phuong Linh
Ray Langenbach
Yee I-Lann
Samuel Lee
Tammy Nguyen
Oanh Phi Phi
Nora Taylor
Abhijan Toto
Ylan Vo
Jason Wee
Tintin Wulia
Midori Yamamura
Many thanks to all contributors and co-editors for the kind collaboration through the assembling of this ambitious project.
Front cover image:
Yee I-Lann, '7-headed Lalandau Hat', 2020,
woven by Lili Naming, Siat Yanau, Shahrizan bin Juin, split bamboo pus weave with kayu uber black natural dye, matt sealant, variable dimensions. Photo: Isaac Collard © Yee I-Lann
Co-edited by Kevin Chua, Lucy Davis, and Nora Taylor the issue ‘Uncontainable Natures’ "gathers artistic contributions, interviews, fiction, and academic essays that contest the ex- tractive regimes and logics of containment that have re-emerged in Southeast Asia since the 1970s in which a recursion of colonialism has brought an evacuated and homogenised image of nature in tow".
The diversity, wealth, and breadth of content and perspectives gathered across the two volumes outline myriad opportunities to rethink the foundations of our practices as well as reconsider the directions of our inquiries. It is our hope that the contributions featured in the two volumes will become staples in syllabi across the arts and humanities and that they will inform the practices of scholars and artists alike for years to come.
Featuring contributions by
Jose Santos P. Ardivilla
Martin Bartelmus
Kevin Chua
Lucy Davis
Darcie DeAngelo
Pujita Guha
Garima Gupta
James Jack
Soumya James
Ayesha Keshani
Art Labor
Nguyễn Phuong Linh
Ray Langenbach
Yee I-Lann
Samuel Lee
Tammy Nguyen
Oanh Phi Phi
Nora Taylor
Abhijan Toto
Ylan Vo
Jason Wee
Tintin Wulia
Midori Yamamura
Many thanks to all contributors and co-editors for the kind collaboration through the assembling of this ambitious project.
Front cover image:
Yee I-Lann, '7-headed Lalandau Hat', 2020,
woven by Lili Naming, Siat Yanau, Shahrizan bin Juin, split bamboo pus weave with kayu uber black natural dye, matt sealant, variable dimensions. Photo: Isaac Collard © Yee I-Lann
Research Interests:
Download free at www.antennae.org.uk The contributions gathered in the third volume of 'Vegetal Entanglements'—a tryptic entirely dedicated to plants in art and culture—focus on the inextricable, actual, and metaphorical links that bind... more
Download free at www.antennae.org.uk
The contributions gathered in the third volume of 'Vegetal Entanglements'—a tryptic entirely dedicated to plants in art and culture—focus on the inextricable, actual, and metaphorical links that bind plants, ecosystems, and humans. In this issue, the interconnectedness that characterizes plant lives is explored through a variety of media and approaches designed to foreground vegetal alterity.
Including contributions by Martin Bartelmus | Jean Marie Carey | Bruno Côrte | Cyprian Gaillard | Carsten Holler | Manuela Infante | Noura Al Khasawneh | Shaun Matthews | Stefano Mancuso | Mike Maunder | Junko Mikuriya | Alexander Moore | Egle Oddo | Raksha Patel | Katrin Petroschkat | Anna Ridler | Dawn Sanders | Vivien Sansour | Basak Senova | Bahia Shehab | Niki Sperou | Cole Swanson | Franziska Weinberger | Lois Weinberger
This issue of Antennae is dedicated to Lois Weinberger (1947-2020).
The contributions gathered in the third volume of 'Vegetal Entanglements'—a tryptic entirely dedicated to plants in art and culture—focus on the inextricable, actual, and metaphorical links that bind plants, ecosystems, and humans. In this issue, the interconnectedness that characterizes plant lives is explored through a variety of media and approaches designed to foreground vegetal alterity.
Including contributions by Martin Bartelmus | Jean Marie Carey | Bruno Côrte | Cyprian Gaillard | Carsten Holler | Manuela Infante | Noura Al Khasawneh | Shaun Matthews | Stefano Mancuso | Mike Maunder | Junko Mikuriya | Alexander Moore | Egle Oddo | Raksha Patel | Katrin Petroschkat | Anna Ridler | Dawn Sanders | Vivien Sansour | Basak Senova | Bahia Shehab | Niki Sperou | Cole Swanson | Franziska Weinberger | Lois Weinberger
This issue of Antennae is dedicated to Lois Weinberger (1947-2020).
Research Interests:
The contributions gathered in the second volume of Vegetal Entanglements—a tryptic entirely dedicated to plants in art and culture—focus on the notion of plant-encounters as an opportunity to overcome plant-blindness and see plants beyond... more
The contributions gathered in the second volume of Vegetal Entanglements—a tryptic entirely dedicated to plants in art and culture—focus on the notion of plant-encounters as an opportunity to overcome plant-blindness and see plants beyond the strictures of epistemic objectification. It is in this context that the artists, scholars, curators, and plant lovers featured on these pages stage and analyse original encounters with the vegetal world; they make visible, problematize, deconstruct and recontextualize to show how encounters with plants define our lives in multiple and often unpredictable ways.
Research Interests:
This issue of Antennae is the first of three installments entirely dedicated to plants in art and culture. The first focuses on different modalities of representation, the second on plant-encounters, and the third on networks. How we... more
This issue of Antennae is the first of three installments entirely dedicated to plants in art and culture. The first focuses on different modalities of representation, the second on plant-encounters, and the third on networks. How we represent plants speaks volumes about our conceptions of their being and our intentions as well as our responsibilities towards them. It is the idea of responsibility that drives this extensive publishing project. Artists and scholars have the responsibility to shift plants to the fore of their preoccupations and to investigate the historical and cultural networks that bind us to them. Plants support all life on this planet and our lack of interest in them is certainly linked to climate change and general environmental deterioration. Paying attention to plants is essential to the possibility of conceiving a better, more equitable, and sustainable future.
Research Interests:
This issue of Antennae marks the celebration of the journal’s ten years of activity. From the very start, Antennae has provided a platform for new voices—it has outlined an academic space marked by a certain fluidity of content and... more
This issue of Antennae marks the celebration of the journal’s ten years of activity. From the very start, Antennae has provided a platform for new voices—it has outlined an academic space marked by a certain fluidity of content and freedom of format designed to foster the multidisciplinarity that is essential to the study of human/non-human relations. It is for this reason that the interview format has constantly been one of the most important publishing dimensions for the journal. It is in interviews that artists and scholars explore the side-lines of their practices, the loose and dead ends, and talk about the 'heart of the matter' with the same level of dedication.
It seems therefore appropriate that Antennae’s first ten years should be marked by the release of two issues entirely dedicated to the interview format. Members of Antennae’s academic and advisory boards were asked to choose their interlocutors in order to address an issue dear to them. The idea was to gather some of the most influential thinkers, artists, writers, and makers in the field of nature and art to produce an archive of contemporary outlooks framed by multidisciplinary outlooks. The result is a series of original perspectives, exchanges, and investigations that capture the essence of what it means to be working with human/non-human issues at this point of the Anthropocene. Commissioning interviews for an issue entirely dedicated to this format is a gamble — it means letting collaborators share the editorial driving seat without knowing exactly where they want to drive. But the gamble has paid off — I could have not hoped for a more colorful cast, and hope Antennae’s readers will find these interviews informative as well as inspirational.
Download Here: http://www.antennae.org.uk/
It seems therefore appropriate that Antennae’s first ten years should be marked by the release of two issues entirely dedicated to the interview format. Members of Antennae’s academic and advisory boards were asked to choose their interlocutors in order to address an issue dear to them. The idea was to gather some of the most influential thinkers, artists, writers, and makers in the field of nature and art to produce an archive of contemporary outlooks framed by multidisciplinary outlooks. The result is a series of original perspectives, exchanges, and investigations that capture the essence of what it means to be working with human/non-human issues at this point of the Anthropocene. Commissioning interviews for an issue entirely dedicated to this format is a gamble — it means letting collaborators share the editorial driving seat without knowing exactly where they want to drive. But the gamble has paid off — I could have not hoped for a more colorful cast, and hope Antennae’s readers will find these interviews informative as well as inspirational.
Download Here: http://www.antennae.org.uk/
Research Interests:
Download file at: www.antennae.org.uk It's a whole new 'Antennae'! After twelve years, we've given 'Antennae' a good makeover. Check out our new issue #47 titled 'Experiment', the first of two installments (the second, out this summer... more
Download file at: www.antennae.org.uk
It's a whole new 'Antennae'! After twelve years, we've given 'Antennae' a good makeover. Check out our new issue #47 titled 'Experiment', the first of two installments (the second, out this summer titled 'Interface') exploring the intricacies and rewards involved in "art and science" collaborations. This issue includes exclusive interviews with artists and scholars whose work has impacted the way we think about disciplinary boundaries, ethics, and aesthetics in modern and contemporary art. From the collaborative network-experiments of Crochet Coral Reef, and Oron Catts and Ionat Zurr's ability to challenge our conception of the living, to mathematics, color perception, storytelling, outer space, and vaccination this certainly is one of our richest issues. And, make sure to check our new flip-book format at the bottom of our home page.
Download free here: www.antennae.org.uk
A team of scholars and artists has also helped us select some of the most exciting representatives of this ever-growing movement. We are thankful to Andrew Yang (Associate Professor of Liberal Arts at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago), Daniela Silvestrin (Curatorial Assistant at Leuphana Universität Lüneburg), Julie Marie Lemon (Program Director & Curator of the University-wide Arts, Science + Culture Initiative,at the University of Chicago), Julia Buntaine Hoel (Conceptual Artist and Director of SciArt Magazine), Ken Rinaldo (artist and professor of robotics at The Ohio State University), and Piero Scaruffi (research on cognitive science and art) for their help and advice. And as always, we would like to thank everyone involved in the making of this issue.
With contributions from: Jenny Rock and Sierra Adler, Roberta Buiani, Oron Catts and Ionat Zurr, Jim Supanick, Melissa Dubbin & Aaron S. Davidson, Helen J. Bullard, Liz Flyntz & Byron Rich with Marnie Benney, Carolyn Angleton, Pei-Ying Lin, Jonathon Keats, Eugenia Cheng, Margaret Wertheim, Alex May, Andy Gracie, Daniela de Paulis, Bettina Forget and Gemma Anderson
It's a whole new 'Antennae'! After twelve years, we've given 'Antennae' a good makeover. Check out our new issue #47 titled 'Experiment', the first of two installments (the second, out this summer titled 'Interface') exploring the intricacies and rewards involved in "art and science" collaborations. This issue includes exclusive interviews with artists and scholars whose work has impacted the way we think about disciplinary boundaries, ethics, and aesthetics in modern and contemporary art. From the collaborative network-experiments of Crochet Coral Reef, and Oron Catts and Ionat Zurr's ability to challenge our conception of the living, to mathematics, color perception, storytelling, outer space, and vaccination this certainly is one of our richest issues. And, make sure to check our new flip-book format at the bottom of our home page.
Download free here: www.antennae.org.uk
A team of scholars and artists has also helped us select some of the most exciting representatives of this ever-growing movement. We are thankful to Andrew Yang (Associate Professor of Liberal Arts at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago), Daniela Silvestrin (Curatorial Assistant at Leuphana Universität Lüneburg), Julie Marie Lemon (Program Director & Curator of the University-wide Arts, Science + Culture Initiative,at the University of Chicago), Julia Buntaine Hoel (Conceptual Artist and Director of SciArt Magazine), Ken Rinaldo (artist and professor of robotics at The Ohio State University), and Piero Scaruffi (research on cognitive science and art) for their help and advice. And as always, we would like to thank everyone involved in the making of this issue.
With contributions from: Jenny Rock and Sierra Adler, Roberta Buiani, Oron Catts and Ionat Zurr, Jim Supanick, Melissa Dubbin & Aaron S. Davidson, Helen J. Bullard, Liz Flyntz & Byron Rich with Marnie Benney, Carolyn Angleton, Pei-Ying Lin, Jonathon Keats, Eugenia Cheng, Margaret Wertheim, Alex May, Andy Gracie, Daniela de Paulis, Bettina Forget and Gemma Anderson
Research Interests:
This is the editorial of Antennae issue #47 dedicated to experiments in art and science. Partly because of the resonance of the posthuman cyborg in the ontological turn; because of the rise of Bio Art; because of the prominence that... more
This is the editorial of Antennae issue #47 dedicated to experiments in art and science. Partly because of the resonance of the posthuman cyborg in the ontological turn; because of the rise of Bio Art; because of the prominence that multidisciplinarity has acquired in academia; and surely in light of our fraught relationship with our environment and climate change, the intersections between art and science have recently become more complexly defined by new ethical, political, aesthetic, and poetic registers.
This project is co-edited in collaboration with American artist and philosopher Jonathon Keats whose bold experiments have raise serious questions and put into practice his conviction that the world needs more “curious amateurs,” willing to explore publicly whatever intrigues them in defiance of a culture that increasingly forecloses on wonder and silos knowledge into narrowly defined areas of expertise.
This project is co-edited in collaboration with American artist and philosopher Jonathon Keats whose bold experiments have raise serious questions and put into practice his conviction that the world needs more “curious amateurs,” willing to explore publicly whatever intrigues them in defiance of a culture that increasingly forecloses on wonder and silos knowledge into narrowly defined areas of expertise.
Research Interests:
Making Nature -- ANTENNAE ISSUE #49 is now online! Edited by Giovanni Aloi and Honor Beddard This issue of Antennae is part of a project informed by the exhibition 'Making Nature: How We See Animals' curated by Honor Beddard at Wellcome... more
Making Nature -- ANTENNAE ISSUE #49 is now online!
Edited by Giovanni Aloi and Honor Beddard
This issue of Antennae is part of a project informed by the exhibition 'Making Nature: How We See Animals' curated by Honor Beddard at Wellcome Collection (London) in 2016-17. This first installment, 'Making Nature', looks at the construction of nature as a cultural pursuit during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. It focuses on issues of visibility and invisibility, both cultural and ecological, to critically appraise the methodological approaches that have defined the philosophies of the discipline. Technologies of visibility like taxidermy, dioramas, macro-photography, and illustration are here juxtaposed to highlight the complicity of art and science in the production of fictional narratives about the world we live in. This outlook should however not be misinterpreted as an attempt to diminish the epistemic importance of natural history but as an invitation to reach further deep into the discipline’s productive core and to devise new natural histories for the twenty-first century. It is in this context that the next installment, also co-edited with Honor Beddard, titled 'Re-making Nature' will more closely focus on the work of contemporary artists whose practice entails revealing the constructedness of nature as a concept to map and untangle important nevralgic and yet overlooked junctions in our coevolutional histories with the rest of the natural world.
With contributions by
Abbas Akhavan | Bergit Arends | Marc Beattie | Giovanni Aloi
Honor Beddard | Emily Eastgate Brink
Aaron Delehanty | Mario A. Di Gregorio
Mark Dion | Maria P. Gindhart
Isabella Kirkland | Maria Lux | Lorraine Simms
Regan Shrumm | Tamsen Young
Doug Young
Download free at Antennae.org.uk
Edited by Giovanni Aloi and Honor Beddard
This issue of Antennae is part of a project informed by the exhibition 'Making Nature: How We See Animals' curated by Honor Beddard at Wellcome Collection (London) in 2016-17. This first installment, 'Making Nature', looks at the construction of nature as a cultural pursuit during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. It focuses on issues of visibility and invisibility, both cultural and ecological, to critically appraise the methodological approaches that have defined the philosophies of the discipline. Technologies of visibility like taxidermy, dioramas, macro-photography, and illustration are here juxtaposed to highlight the complicity of art and science in the production of fictional narratives about the world we live in. This outlook should however not be misinterpreted as an attempt to diminish the epistemic importance of natural history but as an invitation to reach further deep into the discipline’s productive core and to devise new natural histories for the twenty-first century. It is in this context that the next installment, also co-edited with Honor Beddard, titled 'Re-making Nature' will more closely focus on the work of contemporary artists whose practice entails revealing the constructedness of nature as a concept to map and untangle important nevralgic and yet overlooked junctions in our coevolutional histories with the rest of the natural world.
With contributions by
Abbas Akhavan | Bergit Arends | Marc Beattie | Giovanni Aloi
Honor Beddard | Emily Eastgate Brink
Aaron Delehanty | Mario A. Di Gregorio
Mark Dion | Maria P. Gindhart
Isabella Kirkland | Maria Lux | Lorraine Simms
Regan Shrumm | Tamsen Young
Doug Young
Download free at Antennae.org.uk
Research Interests:
This issue of Antennae is part of a project informed by the exhibition 'Making Nature: How We See Animals' held at Wellcome Collection in London and, like the previous, is co-edited with Honor Beddard, who curated it. This installment,... more
This issue of Antennae is part of a project informed by the exhibition 'Making Nature: How We See Animals' held at Wellcome Collection in London and, like the previous, is co-edited with Honor Beddard, who curated it. This installment, Remaking Nature, focuses on the work of contemporary artists whose practice reveals the constructedness of nature as a concept to map and untangle important, and yet overlooked, junctions in our coevolutional histories with the rest of the natural world. This outlook should not be misinterpreted as an attempt to diminish the epistemic importance of natural history but as a desire to reach deeper into the discipline’s productive core and devise new multidisciplinarities of natural histories for the twenty-first century.
Many thanks to Honor Beddard, Wellcome Collection, all the contributors, and everyone involved in the making of this issue.
Many thanks to Honor Beddard, Wellcome Collection, all the contributors, and everyone involved in the making of this issue.
Research Interests:
This issue of Antennae gathers the work of scholars and artists committed to rethinking our relationship with what we once called 'the environment'. In different ways, and through different lenses, they all explore the ambiguities,... more
This issue of Antennae gathers the work of scholars and artists committed to rethinking our relationship with what we once called 'the environment'. In different ways, and through different lenses, they all explore the ambiguities, contradictions, and blind spots that have characterized previous discourses in order to identify new productivities. Thus, the content of this issue raises questions about intentionality in artistic production; it presents the emergence of new aesthetics challenging traditional object/subject dichotomies; it troubles environmental rhetorics for the purpose of engaging with irreducible materialities; and it questions the potentialities art might bear in the development of these new discursive formations and practices.
Download free at www.antennae.org.uk
Download free at www.antennae.org.uk
Research Interests:
ANTENNAE'S NEW ISSUE IS NOW ONLINE: This issue of Antennae gathers a selection of papers presented at a conference, Naturally Hypernatural: Visions of Nature, organized by Suzanne Anker, (Chair, BFA Fine Arts Department at the School of... more
ANTENNAE'S NEW ISSUE IS NOW ONLINE:
This issue of Antennae gathers a selection of papers presented at a conference, Naturally Hypernatural: Visions of Nature, organized by Suzanne Anker, (Chair, BFA Fine Arts Department at the School of Visual Arts New York) and Sabine Flach (Chair, Department of Art History at the University of Graz). As part of the journal's year-long exploration 'beyond human-animal studies' which began in March 2015 with the publication of the first of two installment titled Multispecies Intra-action, Natural Hypernatural's contribution further problematizes the new philosophical and recent artistic approaches to the possibility of viable posthumanist models.
DOWNLOAD FREE @ www.Antennae.org.uk
This issue of Antennae gathers a selection of papers presented at a conference, Naturally Hypernatural: Visions of Nature, organized by Suzanne Anker, (Chair, BFA Fine Arts Department at the School of Visual Arts New York) and Sabine Flach (Chair, Department of Art History at the University of Graz). As part of the journal's year-long exploration 'beyond human-animal studies' which began in March 2015 with the publication of the first of two installment titled Multispecies Intra-action, Natural Hypernatural's contribution further problematizes the new philosophical and recent artistic approaches to the possibility of viable posthumanist models.
DOWNLOAD FREE @ www.Antennae.org.uk
Research Interests:
The zoocentrism that has more recently characterized the rapid development of animal studies has in many ways been productive, but perhaps inadvertently, it has also replaced one centric system with another, substantially bypassing the... more
The zoocentrism that has more recently characterized the rapid development of animal studies has in many ways been productive, but perhaps inadvertently, it has also replaced one centric system with another, substantially bypassing the scientific and philosophical theories that have marked the past fifteen years. As it can be clearly seen by casting an eye on Antennae’s past issues, many of our contributions have already posed questions related to plants, and bacteria, whilst some have nurtured a soft spot for those animals who cannot return the gaze, or that do not ontologically clearly fit any group or species. In brief, expanding our domain of enquiry has always been central to Antennae. It is from this perspective that with this issue, the journal embarks on a new and challenging year-long project focusing on the emerging theories of new materialism, multispecies ethnography, bioart, and environmental concern. This project is titled Beyond Animal Studies and it begins with the publication of two installments dedicated to multispecies-Intra-action: new ways of thinking multispecies aesthetics through Karen Barad’s agential realism, co-edited with artist/curator Madeleine Boyd. This first offering will be followed by an issue edited by artists and theorists Suzanne Anker and Sabine Flach focusing on the proceedings of an exciting conference dedicated to bioart titled Naturally Hypernatural that took place in New York in November 2014. Whilst the last segment of this publishing project will comprise two issues on art and environment that will be made available in December 2015 and March 2016.
Research Interests:
Visual Culture, Animal Studies, Speculative Realism, History of Art, Object Oriented Ontology, and 4 moreHuman-Animal Studies, Visual Cultures of Science (Visual Studies), ethnography, comparative visual media, humanitarianism, human rights, biopolitics, Marxist critique, postcolonial studies, documentary studies, critical theory and cultural studies, posthumanism, animal studies, discourses of the child, and New Materialism
This is the first of two issues of Antennae titled Naturally Hypernatural after a conference organized by Suzanne Anker, (Chair, BFA Fine Arts Department at the School of Visual Arts New York) and Sabine Flach (Chair, Department of Art... more
This is the first of two issues of Antennae titled Naturally Hypernatural after a conference organized by Suzanne Anker, (Chair, BFA Fine Arts Department at the School of Visual Arts New York) and Sabine Flach (Chair, Department of Art History at the University of Graz). Naturally Hypernatural: Visions of Nature investigated the fluctuating 'essences' of 'nature' and the 'natural' in the 21st century. The talks focused on contemporary issues in the visual arts and their intersections with the biological and geological sciences, confirming that nature remains an intrinsically mysterious, ever more mutable entity. Most importantly, the perspectives of the participants to Naturally Hypernatural moved beyond classical human-animal studies approaches for the purpose of considering more complex and intricate interrelations between beings and environments. DOWNLOAD FULL ISSUE AT WWW.ANTENNAE.ORG.UK
Research Interests:
ANTENNAE Issue #43 -- TRUTH.CLIMATE.NOW is now online! Download free here: www.antennae.org.uk With contributions by Lee Harrop, Andrew Yang, Michael Lawton, Brooks Dierdoff, Marianna Tsionki, Falak Vasa, Meredith Leich and Andrew... more
ANTENNAE Issue #43 -- TRUTH.CLIMATE.NOW is now online! Download free here: www.antennae.org.uk
With contributions by Lee Harrop, Andrew Yang, Michael Lawton, Brooks Dierdoff, Marianna Tsionki, Falak Vasa, Meredith Leich and Andrew Malone, Miguel Sbastida, Elizabeth Corr and Petra Bachmaier of Luftwerk (front cover)
On the 16th of November 2016, ‘post-truth’ was officially declared 'word of the year' by the Oxford Dictionary. Following closely on the unexpected results of the US election, the adjective relates to circumstances in which objective facts seem less influential in shaping public opinion than emotional appeals. As a concept, post-truth has enabled a heightened fluidity between fiction and reality, empiricism and mythology, factual and subjective — it has already manifested itself as an insidious, rewriting tool of past and present histories, revealing our reliance on 'truth-making' as a necessary building block of what we used to call civilization, and posing urgent questions about the essence of knowledge production and consumption in today’s cultural economies.
While apocalyptic visions of the Anthropocene appear closer than ever before, we might ask, ‘what is the role played by visual media, art, and communication in supporting, informing, and driving creative forms of viable resistance?’ ‘How is the complicated relationship between art and science impacted by these cultural turns?’ And ‘how might contested notions of truth shape essential research questions and methodologies?’
This issue of Antennae is the first of two installments titled after a symposium I co-organized at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in collaboration with many like-minded colleagues who share similar concerns for the future of our planet. ‘Truth.Climate.Now.’ creatively addressed recent discourses and practices that define our complex relationship with nature and culture in the current political moment. Much of its focus revolved around how notions of post-truth might impact the already complicated relationship between art and science. How might contested notions of truth shape essential research questions and methodologies? The representations, policies, and lived experiences of climate change inevitably became a point of culmination for all of these concerns.
With contributions by Lee Harrop, Andrew Yang, Michael Lawton, Brooks Dierdoff, Marianna Tsionki, Falak Vasa, Meredith Leich and Andrew Malone, Miguel Sbastida, Elizabeth Corr and Petra Bachmaier of Luftwerk (front cover)
On the 16th of November 2016, ‘post-truth’ was officially declared 'word of the year' by the Oxford Dictionary. Following closely on the unexpected results of the US election, the adjective relates to circumstances in which objective facts seem less influential in shaping public opinion than emotional appeals. As a concept, post-truth has enabled a heightened fluidity between fiction and reality, empiricism and mythology, factual and subjective — it has already manifested itself as an insidious, rewriting tool of past and present histories, revealing our reliance on 'truth-making' as a necessary building block of what we used to call civilization, and posing urgent questions about the essence of knowledge production and consumption in today’s cultural economies.
While apocalyptic visions of the Anthropocene appear closer than ever before, we might ask, ‘what is the role played by visual media, art, and communication in supporting, informing, and driving creative forms of viable resistance?’ ‘How is the complicated relationship between art and science impacted by these cultural turns?’ And ‘how might contested notions of truth shape essential research questions and methodologies?’
This issue of Antennae is the first of two installments titled after a symposium I co-organized at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in collaboration with many like-minded colleagues who share similar concerns for the future of our planet. ‘Truth.Climate.Now.’ creatively addressed recent discourses and practices that define our complex relationship with nature and culture in the current political moment. Much of its focus revolved around how notions of post-truth might impact the already complicated relationship between art and science. How might contested notions of truth shape essential research questions and methodologies? The representations, policies, and lived experiences of climate change inevitably became a point of culmination for all of these concerns.
Research Interests:
ANTENNAE ISSUE #44 is now online! While apocalyptic visions of the Anthropocene appear closer than ever before, we might ask, ‘what is the role played by visual media, art, and communication in supporting, informing, and driving... more
ANTENNAE ISSUE #44 is now online!
While apocalyptic visions of the Anthropocene appear closer than ever before, we might ask, ‘what is the role played by visual media, art, and communication in supporting, informing, and driving creative forms of viable resistance?’ ‘How is the complicated relationship between art and science impacted by recent cultural shifts?’ And ‘how might contested notions of truth shape essential research questions and methodologies?’
This issue of 'Antennae' is the second of two installments titled after a symposium I co-organized at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in collaboration with many like-minded colleagues who share similar concerns for the future of our planet. 'Truth.Climate.Now.' creatively addressed recent discourses and practices that define our complex relationship with nature and culture in the current political moment. Much of its focus revolved around how notions of post-truth might impact the already complicated relationship between art and science. How might contested notions of truth shape essential research questions and methodologies? The representations, policies, and lived experiences of climate change inevitably became a point of culmination for all of these concerns. This issue is in part informed by the content of the symposium and the events that surrounded it.
With original contributions by:
Steve Klee, Karsten Lund, Industry of the Ordinary, Jeremy Bolen, Shoa Alattas, Sara Black and Amber Ginsburg – Kyveli Mavrokordopoulou and Sanne Sinnige, Brian Kirkbride, and Tyler Morgan
Download here: www.antennae.org.uk
While apocalyptic visions of the Anthropocene appear closer than ever before, we might ask, ‘what is the role played by visual media, art, and communication in supporting, informing, and driving creative forms of viable resistance?’ ‘How is the complicated relationship between art and science impacted by recent cultural shifts?’ And ‘how might contested notions of truth shape essential research questions and methodologies?’
This issue of 'Antennae' is the second of two installments titled after a symposium I co-organized at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in collaboration with many like-minded colleagues who share similar concerns for the future of our planet. 'Truth.Climate.Now.' creatively addressed recent discourses and practices that define our complex relationship with nature and culture in the current political moment. Much of its focus revolved around how notions of post-truth might impact the already complicated relationship between art and science. How might contested notions of truth shape essential research questions and methodologies? The representations, policies, and lived experiences of climate change inevitably became a point of culmination for all of these concerns. This issue is in part informed by the content of the symposium and the events that surrounded it.
With original contributions by:
Steve Klee, Karsten Lund, Industry of the Ordinary, Jeremy Bolen, Shoa Alattas, Sara Black and Amber Ginsburg – Kyveli Mavrokordopoulou and Sanne Sinnige, Brian Kirkbride, and Tyler Morgan
Download here: www.antennae.org.uk
Research Interests:
From canvases and layers of paint, to classical and new materialities in contemporary art, surfaces have always played important and yet unacknowledged roles. Surfaces are slivers of materiality upon which we evaluate and judge everything... more
From canvases and layers of paint, to classical and new materialities in contemporary art, surfaces have always played important and yet unacknowledged roles. Surfaces are slivers of materiality upon which we evaluate and judge everything around us. Surfaces are ultimately defined by our gaze— they only reveal to us what we can see: the outermost layer of things. Dissection of human and animal bodies only goes deeper into matter constantly revealing new surfaces in the form of tendons, muscles, bones. And even when the flesh is sliced open, the process only multiplies surfaces for us to see.
Thin objects, like leaves or photographs appear to be essentially constituted by surfaces whilst in others, surfaces conceal a depth they have been grafted upon; they are veneers. Veneers claim membership to economic or historical realities that are extrinsic to the mass of the object they envelop. The deceit of the senses they achieve exclusively plays out upon on a superficial level.
Download at www.antennae.org.uk
Thin objects, like leaves or photographs appear to be essentially constituted by surfaces whilst in others, surfaces conceal a depth they have been grafted upon; they are veneers. Veneers claim membership to economic or historical realities that are extrinsic to the mass of the object they envelop. The deceit of the senses they achieve exclusively plays out upon on a superficial level.
Download at www.antennae.org.uk
Building on the success of our 2021 symposium in which transdisciplinary dialogue was generated around the newly enlivened subject of vegetal life, Phytogenesis II seeks to expand the field of enquiry by exploring more overtly political... more
Building on the success of our 2021 symposium in which transdisciplinary dialogue was generated around the newly enlivened subject of vegetal life, Phytogenesis II seeks to expand the field of enquiry by exploring more overtly political and activist nuances and provocations in the plant-philosophy-photography assemblage.
Climate change, and its devastating global effects, provides an impetus for this shift in focus, away from the instrumental and towards the ethical, allowing for ‘plant-human becomings and coevolutions to emerge’ (Aloi, 2018).
The recordings from Phytogenesis II from 23 Mar 2022 are now available online:
Phytogenesis II One (Dr Prudence Gibson & Dr Fabri Blacklock; Malcolm Dickson, Dr Uriel Orlow, Nettie Edwards, William Arnold):
https://plymouth.cloud.panopto.eu/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=b0f9037a-2cd9-44a8-bc31-ae61014f0c3c
Phytogenesis II Two (William Arnold, Jamie House, Hannah Fletcher, Dr Giovanni Aloi):
https://plymouth.cloud.panopto.eu/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=2d8b6e96-e5fb-40f1-b564-ae61014eec6a
Climate change, and its devastating global effects, provides an impetus for this shift in focus, away from the instrumental and towards the ethical, allowing for ‘plant-human becomings and coevolutions to emerge’ (Aloi, 2018).
The recordings from Phytogenesis II from 23 Mar 2022 are now available online:
Phytogenesis II One (Dr Prudence Gibson & Dr Fabri Blacklock; Malcolm Dickson, Dr Uriel Orlow, Nettie Edwards, William Arnold):
https://plymouth.cloud.panopto.eu/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=b0f9037a-2cd9-44a8-bc31-ae61014f0c3c
Phytogenesis II Two (William Arnold, Jamie House, Hannah Fletcher, Dr Giovanni Aloi):
https://plymouth.cloud.panopto.eu/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=2d8b6e96-e5fb-40f1-b564-ae61014eec6a
Research Interests:
Join me on September 17th, 7:00pm CST for a discussion on symbolism, objectification, and anthropocentrism in the representation of plants in art. Kindly organized by Alejandro Ponce de León, supported by Museo la Tertulia in Cali,... more
Join me on September 17th, 7:00pm CST for a discussion on symbolism, objectification, and anthropocentrism in the representation of plants in art. Kindly organized by Alejandro Ponce de León, supported by Museo la Tertulia in Cali, Colombia.
Conversation in English.
More info and readings, here:
https://www.humanidadesambientales.com/pensar/9-plantas-en-el-arte
Join Zoom Meeting:
https://ucdavis.zoom.us/j/93923508253?pwd=ZHI5TytGUDdGT1BMZ3ZmbWUzZm91Zz09
Meeting ID: 939 2350 8253
Passcode: lfreud
Conversation in English.
More info and readings, here:
https://www.humanidadesambientales.com/pensar/9-plantas-en-el-arte
Join Zoom Meeting:
https://ucdavis.zoom.us/j/93923508253?pwd=ZHI5TytGUDdGT1BMZ3ZmbWUzZm91Zz09
Meeting ID: 939 2350 8253
Passcode: lfreud
Research Interests:
Arte Povera is one of the most influential, and yet “under the radar”, art movements to come out of Italy during the last century. Since its appearance in the late 1960s, the works of Giuseppe Penone, Marisa Merz, Jannis Kounellis, among... more
Arte Povera is one of the most influential, and yet “under the radar”, art movements to come out of Italy during the last century. Since its appearance in the late 1960s, the works of Giuseppe Penone, Marisa Merz, Jannis Kounellis, among others, have strongly influenced the international contemporary art scene, revolutionizing the ways in which artists think about materials and art institutions.
Arte Povera radically changed the history of conceptual art through its political views on capitalism, social structures, urbanization, and environmental degradation. Today, these subjects have become even more urgent and define the practices of many internationally well-known artists.
This is the first in a series of three lectures to explore the key artists and major innovations introduced by Arte Povera to better appreciate the importance and impact of Italian art. The series will look at the international and local historical contexts from which Arte Povera emerged, starting from an exploration of the philosophical and artistic ideas that linked Northern Italy to France and the rest of the world.
Arte Povera radically changed the history of conceptual art through its political views on capitalism, social structures, urbanization, and environmental degradation. Today, these subjects have become even more urgent and define the practices of many internationally well-known artists.
This is the first in a series of three lectures to explore the key artists and major innovations introduced by Arte Povera to better appreciate the importance and impact of Italian art. The series will look at the international and local historical contexts from which Arte Povera emerged, starting from an exploration of the philosophical and artistic ideas that linked Northern Italy to France and the rest of the world.
Research Interests:
'Sorely Visible: Plants, Roots, and National Identity' is Giovanni Aloi's keynote talk at the Hothouse Archives Symposium held at the School of Visual Arts in NYC, 2018. The talk considers the role played by plant-politics and... more
'Sorely Visible: Plants, Roots, and National Identity' is Giovanni Aloi's keynote talk at the Hothouse Archives Symposium held at the School of Visual Arts in NYC, 2018. The talk considers the role played by plant-politics and architectural aesthetics in constructing national identity and otherness based on persistent misrepresentations of plant life.
Abstract:
The last few years have been characterized by dramatic socio-cultural reveals: from Brexit to Trump’s election, the unthinkable has manifested itself as the index of insidious and undervalued ideological networks.
On February 2017, Starbucks Coffee Co, in collaboration with Italian architect Marco Bay, installed a grove of palm and banana trees opposite Milan’s much-loved gothic cathedral. Public opinion instantly split. Milan’s rude awakening revealed a tale of two cities: on one side were those who lauded the initiative and on the opposite those who condemned the exotic origin of the trees as unrepresentative of true Italianicity.
Against the backdrop of the recent North-African and Middle-Eastern diasporas that have strained relationships between Italy and the European Union, palms and bananas have found themselves at the center of an unexpectedly acrimonious, public discussion.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzewBiH1UV8&t=2s
Abstract:
The last few years have been characterized by dramatic socio-cultural reveals: from Brexit to Trump’s election, the unthinkable has manifested itself as the index of insidious and undervalued ideological networks.
On February 2017, Starbucks Coffee Co, in collaboration with Italian architect Marco Bay, installed a grove of palm and banana trees opposite Milan’s much-loved gothic cathedral. Public opinion instantly split. Milan’s rude awakening revealed a tale of two cities: on one side were those who lauded the initiative and on the opposite those who condemned the exotic origin of the trees as unrepresentative of true Italianicity.
Against the backdrop of the recent North-African and Middle-Eastern diasporas that have strained relationships between Italy and the European Union, palms and bananas have found themselves at the center of an unexpectedly acrimonious, public discussion.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzewBiH1UV8&t=2s
Research Interests:
What is at stake in the re-imagining of disciplinary boundaries through the pursing of new epistemic strategies involving multispecies networks? What may the aesthetic repercussions of such new directions be? How can art produced within... more
What is at stake in the re-imagining of disciplinary boundaries through the pursing of new epistemic strategies involving multispecies networks? What may the aesthetic repercussions of such new directions be? How can art produced within these new parameters impact on everyday life? These are some of the questions we will attempt to answer at this one day symposium gathering faculty and students engaged in the subject of posthumanism and the arts.
The reconfiguration of anthropocentrism taken on by queer theory, animal-studies, and posthumanism, has now given over to the emerging methodological approaches of speculative realism, new materialism, and object-oriented ontology. Building upon the established framework of posthumanism, this symposium aims at exploring the productive opportunities these new approaches provide in specific relation to contemporary art. Moving beyond the growing zoöcentrism that characterizes current animal studies, the focus of this event will be centered on the possibilities of reconceiving ethicalities, methodologies, and aesthetic strategies as inscribed in the biotechnological, biocapitalist, and "deep time" frameworks of the proposed Anthropocene. In search of new epistemological opportunities that try to make equal sense of different life-forms within shared and interwoven ecosystems, we will appraise the role art may play in shifting naturalized anthropocentric mind-frames into a more expansive space. From bacteria to fungi, invertebrates to plants, beings that can return the gaze and those who do not, this symposium will contribute to the mapping of new opportunities for considering the role art can play in triggering societal changes.
HUMAN-NON-HUMAN NETWORKS
a symposium organized by Giovanni Aloi, David Getsy, and Andrew Yang taking place at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago
on Saturday the 12th of March 2016
SAIC Ballroom, 112 S. Michigan Ave.
From 10am
List of speakers:
Giovanni Aloi
James Elkins
Lindsey French
Marissa Lee Benedict
Marlena Novak and Jay Alan Yim
Andrew Yang
With a Keynote from:
Eva Hayward
(University of Arizona)
The reconfiguration of anthropocentrism taken on by queer theory, animal-studies, and posthumanism, has now given over to the emerging methodological approaches of speculative realism, new materialism, and object-oriented ontology. Building upon the established framework of posthumanism, this symposium aims at exploring the productive opportunities these new approaches provide in specific relation to contemporary art. Moving beyond the growing zoöcentrism that characterizes current animal studies, the focus of this event will be centered on the possibilities of reconceiving ethicalities, methodologies, and aesthetic strategies as inscribed in the biotechnological, biocapitalist, and "deep time" frameworks of the proposed Anthropocene. In search of new epistemological opportunities that try to make equal sense of different life-forms within shared and interwoven ecosystems, we will appraise the role art may play in shifting naturalized anthropocentric mind-frames into a more expansive space. From bacteria to fungi, invertebrates to plants, beings that can return the gaze and those who do not, this symposium will contribute to the mapping of new opportunities for considering the role art can play in triggering societal changes.
HUMAN-NON-HUMAN NETWORKS
a symposium organized by Giovanni Aloi, David Getsy, and Andrew Yang taking place at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago
on Saturday the 12th of March 2016
SAIC Ballroom, 112 S. Michigan Ave.
From 10am
List of speakers:
Giovanni Aloi
James Elkins
Lindsey French
Marissa Lee Benedict
Marlena Novak and Jay Alan Yim
Andrew Yang
With a Keynote from:
Eva Hayward
(University of Arizona)
Research Interests:
Art History, Art Theory, Contemporary Art, Posthumanism, Animal Studies, and 9 moreCritical Posthumanism, Speculative Realism, Animals and Animality, Philosophy Of Animals, Object Oriented Ontology, Animals in Culture, Multispecies Ethnography, New Materialism, and New Materialism in Contemporary art
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0kzcQEPefM This is an audio recording of the lecture titled 'The Lure of the Veneer: Taxidermy in Contemporary Art' presented by Dr. Giovanni Aloi at the conference 'The Skin of Objects' organized by... more
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0kzcQEPefM
This is an audio recording of the lecture titled 'The Lure of the Veneer: Taxidermy in Contemporary Art' presented by Dr. Giovanni Aloi at the conference 'The Skin of Objects' organized by The University of East Anglia and Norfolk Museum held at Norwich Castle on the 27th of June 2015.
The Lure of the Veneer
This paper argues that the current popularity of taxidermy in contemporary art can be productively understood within the art historical context of an ontological revolution of surfaces in sculpture. Amongst others, over the past few years, James Elkins has criticized the reluctance with which history of art has engaged with the materiality and surfaces of art objects. Simultaneously, the new philosophical waves of Object Oriented Ontology and New Materialism have outlined new and exciting approaches through which our relationships with materiality, and most importantly with surfaces in works of art, may be understood beyond the strictures of traditional art historical enquiry.
The new emergence of the materiality of animal skin in the gallery space proposes an ambiguous play of realism caught between abstraction and figuration. Here the indexicality embodied by the materiality of animal skin semantically functions in unique ways: it exceeds the photographic and transcends the sculptural. Focusing on case studies involving the work of artists Steven Bishop and Berlinde de Bruyckere this paper contextualizes the presence of animal skins in contemporary art as a phenomenon related to the surrealist attention for surfaces in everyday objects and bio-matter. Ultimately, the return to this artistic heritage is here positioned as a counterweight that problematizes the immateriality of the virtual reality characterizing the current stage of the anthropocene.
This is an audio recording of the lecture titled 'The Lure of the Veneer: Taxidermy in Contemporary Art' presented by Dr. Giovanni Aloi at the conference 'The Skin of Objects' organized by The University of East Anglia and Norfolk Museum held at Norwich Castle on the 27th of June 2015.
The Lure of the Veneer
This paper argues that the current popularity of taxidermy in contemporary art can be productively understood within the art historical context of an ontological revolution of surfaces in sculpture. Amongst others, over the past few years, James Elkins has criticized the reluctance with which history of art has engaged with the materiality and surfaces of art objects. Simultaneously, the new philosophical waves of Object Oriented Ontology and New Materialism have outlined new and exciting approaches through which our relationships with materiality, and most importantly with surfaces in works of art, may be understood beyond the strictures of traditional art historical enquiry.
The new emergence of the materiality of animal skin in the gallery space proposes an ambiguous play of realism caught between abstraction and figuration. Here the indexicality embodied by the materiality of animal skin semantically functions in unique ways: it exceeds the photographic and transcends the sculptural. Focusing on case studies involving the work of artists Steven Bishop and Berlinde de Bruyckere this paper contextualizes the presence of animal skins in contemporary art as a phenomenon related to the surrealist attention for surfaces in everyday objects and bio-matter. Ultimately, the return to this artistic heritage is here positioned as a counterweight that problematizes the immateriality of the virtual reality characterizing the current stage of the anthropocene.
Research Interests:
What roles does taxidermy play in our relationship with live animals today? How does it operate as a signifier in contemporary representation? The paper discusses the photographic work of internationally renowned artist Roni Horn, paying... more
What roles does taxidermy play in our relationship with live animals today? How does it operate as a signifier in contemporary representation? The paper discusses the photographic work of internationally renowned artist Roni Horn, paying particular attention to her work Dead Owl (1997) and the series Bird (1998-2007) both of which involve taxidermy. In relation to these works, I will argue that in opposition to the predominantly negative connotations taxidermy has acquired in human-animal studies discourses, Horn’s approach to taxidermy and the photographic idiom alike constitute a productive problematizer of animal representation.
Portraying Animals
On the Role of Animals in Pictorial Representations
Prague, National Gallery
May 15, 2015, 11am-7pm
Portraying Animals
On the Role of Animals in Pictorial Representations
Prague, National Gallery
May 15, 2015, 11am-7pm
Research Interests:
“Why Look at Plants?” Monday, January 12, 2015 4:30 pm Social Sciences Tea Room (SS201) This workshop will consist of a presentation followed by a discussion. The attached essay, “Of Plants and Other Secrets” by Michael Marder, should... more
“Why Look at Plants?”
Monday, January 12, 2015
4:30 pm
Social Sciences Tea Room (SS201)
This workshop will consist of a presentation followed by a discussion. The attached essay, “Of Plants and Other Secrets” by Michael Marder, should be read in advance.
New definitions of plant intelligence and plant agency have over the past thirty years already made a mark on the scientific record but have yet to substantially capture the imagination of scholars in the humanities. How productive would a different consideration of plants turn out to be for Animal Studies? What challenges are involved in further rethinking animal ontologies? What impact would a different consideration of human-plant relationships have on broader environmental/eco-issues/systems?
Monday, January 12, 2015
4:30 pm
Social Sciences Tea Room (SS201)
This workshop will consist of a presentation followed by a discussion. The attached essay, “Of Plants and Other Secrets” by Michael Marder, should be read in advance.
New definitions of plant intelligence and plant agency have over the past thirty years already made a mark on the scientific record but have yet to substantially capture the imagination of scholars in the humanities. How productive would a different consideration of plants turn out to be for Animal Studies? What challenges are involved in further rethinking animal ontologies? What impact would a different consideration of human-plant relationships have on broader environmental/eco-issues/systems?
Research Interests:
My contribution to a BBC Radio 4 documentary on butterflies in culture can be heard online. Shards of stained glass falling through sunlight - the butterfly is an image of beauty. Delicate, colourful yet exquisitely fragile we have... more
My contribution to a BBC Radio 4 documentary on butterflies in culture can be heard online.
Shards of stained glass falling through sunlight - the butterfly is an image of beauty. Delicate, colourful yet exquisitely fragile we have painted and eulogised the butterfly from time immemorial.
A "butterfly mind" skips from subject to subject... they are modern metaphors for the trivial and light-hearted. Yet we forget that at times some butterflies have been used as menacing creatures.
Their eye-spots, used to deter predators, were interpreted as eyes watching you from hedgerow and meadow to make sure no lewd behaviour happened in the fields. The deep, blood red colour of the red admiral was seen as a sign of Christ's crucifixion and therefore a symbol of suffering a death.
The butterfly metamorphoses between body forms, reminding us that our earthly body will one day be transformed.
Butterflies have also been the subject of overwhelming passion. Intense, obsessive collectors have chased them over every continent, even shooting them from the skies with guns and then trembling with overwhelming excitement as they put a blackened, torn creature into their displays. They are souls of the dead flying to heaven or an inspiration for fashion designers, or a symbol of death. Few creatures have had so much laid on their delicate shoulders.
Today, butterflies are symbols of freedom and harmony with nature, the poster insects for a utopia where people and nature are at one.
Shards of stained glass falling through sunlight - the butterfly is an image of beauty. Delicate, colourful yet exquisitely fragile we have painted and eulogised the butterfly from time immemorial.
A "butterfly mind" skips from subject to subject... they are modern metaphors for the trivial and light-hearted. Yet we forget that at times some butterflies have been used as menacing creatures.
Their eye-spots, used to deter predators, were interpreted as eyes watching you from hedgerow and meadow to make sure no lewd behaviour happened in the fields. The deep, blood red colour of the red admiral was seen as a sign of Christ's crucifixion and therefore a symbol of suffering a death.
The butterfly metamorphoses between body forms, reminding us that our earthly body will one day be transformed.
Butterflies have also been the subject of overwhelming passion. Intense, obsessive collectors have chased them over every continent, even shooting them from the skies with guns and then trembling with overwhelming excitement as they put a blackened, torn creature into their displays. They are souls of the dead flying to heaven or an inspiration for fashion designers, or a symbol of death. Few creatures have had so much laid on their delicate shoulders.
Today, butterflies are symbols of freedom and harmony with nature, the poster insects for a utopia where people and nature are at one.
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
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Research Interests:
Arte Povera literally means “Poor Art”, art made with poor everyday materials—art in which the histories, identities, and trajectories of quotidian life challenge the purity and utopian ideals of the gallery space. In the hands of artists... more
Arte Povera literally means “Poor Art”, art made with poor everyday materials—art in which the histories, identities, and trajectories of quotidian life challenge the purity and utopian ideals of the gallery space. In the hands of artists like Marisa Merz, Jannis Kounellis, Pino Pascali, or Michelangelo Pistoletto the irreverent materiality and textures of natural and man-made objects embody political statements challenging past and present cultural values. This month’s lecture explores Arte Povera’s complex relationship with materiality and its persistent influence in contemporary art.
Research Interests:
On October 8th 2011, 'Animal Ecologies in Visual Culture', a symposium organized by 'Antennae: The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture' took place at University College London. In that occasion Giovanni Aloi, Lecturer in History of... more
On October 8th 2011, 'Animal Ecologies in Visual Culture', a symposium organized by 'Antennae: The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture' took place at University College London. In that occasion Giovanni Aloi, Lecturer in History of Art/Visual Culture and Editor in Chief of 'Antennae' and Ron Broglio, Professor of English and Member of Antennae's Academic Board delivered a 'joint-effort presentation' titled 'Towards New Animal Phenomenologies'. This video presents Broglio's contribution and includes a Q&A with an impressive audience of animal-studies scholars.
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Towards New Animal Phenomenologies
What is an animal phenomenology? What is it to be an animal, not as observed from the perspective of natural history but from under the fur of the beasts themselves? This does not mean asking what it is like to run like a cheetah? The concern in this problem is not "likeness"; it is not an issue of similarity. Rather, what is running for the cheetah? What is swimming for the seal and slithering for the anaconda and bedding down for the cat. Traditionally, phenomenology is interested in how humans are embedded in their world, a world of material things, cultural meanings, and physiological engagement. As such, phenomenology is decidedly anthropocentric. It is interested in how we humans move in the world as we perceive it. There are good reasons for such bias. After all, the human world is what we know best, and inquiry into the animal world proves rather tricky. Thomas Nagel's essay "What is it like to be a bat?" first posed the question of animal phenomenology and ever since, the impossibility of embodying another perspective haunts philosophy and art. How is one to get outside of one's world to think and to feel from another point of view and what productivities may arise from such accomplishments? These questions of the animal's world we are confronted with how to understand another's perspective without reducing it to our own and without throwing out parts of another's world which we cannot understand. In its foreignness the animal other becomes radically Other. In early 1900 Jakob von Uexküll offered an opportunity for a different understanding of animals wordliness, specifically with regards to taxonomically distant beings. Umwelt, a pioneering concept devised for the mapping of microenvironments of animals was developed whilst studying ticks. Von Uexküll’s interest in the infinite variety of perceptual worlds of imperscrutable animals drove him to develop the concept in order to avoid being trapped in the false knowledge imposed by human judgement, anthropomorphism and the superimposition of human values. Agamben described Umwelt as follows:
Where classical science saw a single world that comprised within it all living species hierarchically ordered from the most elementary forms up to the higher organisms, Uexkull instead supposes an infinite variety of perceptual worlds that, though they are uncommunicating and reciprocally exclusive, are all equally perfect and linked together as if in a gigantic musical score. (TO 2004:40)
Ron Broglio and Giovanni Aloi discuss the problematics and possibilities in understanding non-human worlds and how art may help us mediating between human cultures and animal worldings.
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Towards New Animal Phenomenologies
What is an animal phenomenology? What is it to be an animal, not as observed from the perspective of natural history but from under the fur of the beasts themselves? This does not mean asking what it is like to run like a cheetah? The concern in this problem is not "likeness"; it is not an issue of similarity. Rather, what is running for the cheetah? What is swimming for the seal and slithering for the anaconda and bedding down for the cat. Traditionally, phenomenology is interested in how humans are embedded in their world, a world of material things, cultural meanings, and physiological engagement. As such, phenomenology is decidedly anthropocentric. It is interested in how we humans move in the world as we perceive it. There are good reasons for such bias. After all, the human world is what we know best, and inquiry into the animal world proves rather tricky. Thomas Nagel's essay "What is it like to be a bat?" first posed the question of animal phenomenology and ever since, the impossibility of embodying another perspective haunts philosophy and art. How is one to get outside of one's world to think and to feel from another point of view and what productivities may arise from such accomplishments? These questions of the animal's world we are confronted with how to understand another's perspective without reducing it to our own and without throwing out parts of another's world which we cannot understand. In its foreignness the animal other becomes radically Other. In early 1900 Jakob von Uexküll offered an opportunity for a different understanding of animals wordliness, specifically with regards to taxonomically distant beings. Umwelt, a pioneering concept devised for the mapping of microenvironments of animals was developed whilst studying ticks. Von Uexküll’s interest in the infinite variety of perceptual worlds of imperscrutable animals drove him to develop the concept in order to avoid being trapped in the false knowledge imposed by human judgement, anthropomorphism and the superimposition of human values. Agamben described Umwelt as follows:
Where classical science saw a single world that comprised within it all living species hierarchically ordered from the most elementary forms up to the higher organisms, Uexkull instead supposes an infinite variety of perceptual worlds that, though they are uncommunicating and reciprocally exclusive, are all equally perfect and linked together as if in a gigantic musical score. (TO 2004:40)
Ron Broglio and Giovanni Aloi discuss the problematics and possibilities in understanding non-human worlds and how art may help us mediating between human cultures and animal worldings.
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On October 8th 2011, 'Animal Ecologies in Visual Culture', a symposium organized by 'Antennae: The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture' took place at University College London. In that occasion Giovanni Aloi, Lecturer in History of... more
On October 8th 2011, 'Animal Ecologies in Visual Culture', a symposium organized by 'Antennae: The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture' took place at University College London. In that occasion Giovanni Aloi, Lecturer in History of Art/Visual Culture and Editor in Chief of 'Antennae' and Ron Broglio, Professor of English and Member of Antennae's Academic Board delivered a 'joint-effort presentation' titled 'Towards New Animal Phenomenologies'. This video presents Aloi's contribution whilst Broglio's is available in a separate video including the Q&A with an impressive audience of animal-studies scholars.
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New conceptions of vegetal life are now emerging. Groundbreaking scientific research and new philosophical perspectives are raising botanical challenges to our anthropocentric cultural background assumptions. And while science has been... more
New conceptions of vegetal life are now emerging. Groundbreaking scientific research and new philosophical perspectives are raising botanical challenges to our anthropocentric cultural background assumptions. And while science has been engaging the complexity of plants for some time, the humanities are just now beginning to consider vegetal beings as inhabiting very different, and yet related, sensorial dimensions to those of humans and other animals. A multidisciplinary approach to plant-life can reveal the importance of ecological interconnectedness and lead to a more nuanced appreciation of the variety of living organisms with which we share the planet. As climate change threatens all forms of life on the planet, considering human/plant relationships from new perspectives is essential to addressing urgent issues of mutual sustainability.
This symposium capitalizes on contemporary art’s ability to productively unhinge scientific theories and certainties in order to help us reconsider unquestioned beliefs about this living world. Through Botanical Speculations researchers, artists, art historians, and activists will collaboratively map the uncharted territories of new forms of botanical knowledge.
This symposium capitalizes on contemporary art’s ability to productively unhinge scientific theories and certainties in order to help us reconsider unquestioned beliefs about this living world. Through Botanical Speculations researchers, artists, art historians, and activists will collaboratively map the uncharted territories of new forms of botanical knowledge.
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A review of 'Devour the Land: War and American Landscape Photography since 1970', an exhibition held between September 17, 2021–January 16, 2022, Special Exhibitions Gallery, Harvard Art Museums. How do photographs portray... more
A review of 'Devour the Land: War and American Landscape Photography since 1970', an exhibition held between September 17, 2021–January 16, 2022, Special Exhibitions Gallery, Harvard Art Museums.
How do photographs portray environmental damage that can be difficult to see, much less identify and measure? By posing such questions, the exhibition provides visitors a space to consider our current challenges and shared future. At the same time, the works on view also suggest how preparations for war and the aftermath can sometimes lead to surprising instances of ecological regeneration and change.
Following a trajectory that originates in the Civil War era, Devour the Land begins with the 1970s, a dynamic period for both environmental activism and photography. From there, the focus expands to our contemporary moment.
How do photographs portray environmental damage that can be difficult to see, much less identify and measure? By posing such questions, the exhibition provides visitors a space to consider our current challenges and shared future. At the same time, the works on view also suggest how preparations for war and the aftermath can sometimes lead to surprising instances of ecological regeneration and change.
Following a trajectory that originates in the Civil War era, Devour the Land begins with the 1970s, a dynamic period for both environmental activism and photography. From there, the focus expands to our contemporary moment.
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INTERVIEW BORDER CROSSINGS 2012 - 'Human/Nature' pp.32-49 Interview by Robert Enright.
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Open Editorial on COP26 and 'Climate Rhetoric' for the Chicago Tribune
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This is a short text I have written to introduce the NRDC-sponsored and co-curated project 'Water Works' taking place at CHICAGO EXPO. Water Works invites a select group of contemporary artists — Doug Fogelson, Jenny Kendler, Meg... more
This is a short text I have written to introduce the NRDC-sponsored and co-curated project 'Water Works' taking place at CHICAGO EXPO.
Water Works invites a select group of contemporary
artists — Doug Fogelson, Jenny Kendler, Meg Leary,
Aspen Mays, Linda Tegg, and Alex Wieder — to
create ephemeral interventions at EXPO CHICAGO
using water as their only resource. The series
revolves around Water Light Graffiti, a digital surface
that illuminates when touched by water. Created by
Paris-based artist Antonin Fourneau, Water Light
Graffiti merges the immediacy of street-art with the
sophistication of digital technology and the movement
of the cinematic screen.
Water Works invites a select group of contemporary
artists — Doug Fogelson, Jenny Kendler, Meg Leary,
Aspen Mays, Linda Tegg, and Alex Wieder — to
create ephemeral interventions at EXPO CHICAGO
using water as their only resource. The series
revolves around Water Light Graffiti, a digital surface
that illuminates when touched by water. Created by
Paris-based artist Antonin Fourneau, Water Light
Graffiti merges the immediacy of street-art with the
sophistication of digital technology and the movement
of the cinematic screen.
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New CfP for Antennae on Posthumanisties Today.
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Postcolonial Studies, Posthumanism, Visual Culture, Critical Race Theory, Race and Ethnicity, and 9 moreAfrican American Visual Culture, Critical Posthumanism, African American Culture, Nature of science and technology, Nature, Anthropocene studies, History and nature of science, Anthropocene, and Culture and the Anthropocene
A conversation between Art Historian Cecilia Novero and Giovanni Aloi about his latest book, 'Speculative Taxidermy'.
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For this issue of Antennae: Journal of Nature in Visual Culture, the editorial team seeks submissions from writers, artists, curators, and cultural theorists working with nature, ecology, and post-humanistic philosophy in Southeast Asia.... more
For this issue of Antennae: Journal of Nature in Visual Culture, the editorial team seeks submissions from writers, artists, curators, and cultural theorists working with nature, ecology, and post-humanistic philosophy in Southeast Asia. The past few decades have seen a resurgence of forms of containment in Southeast Asia, whether political (new governmental exclusions and repressions) or epistemological (new scientific understandings of nature). More acutely, certain governments and non-governmental organizations have utilized and underwritten a politics of nature, instrumentalizing nature for their own ends. This issue will gather papers and artistic contributions that contest this new reality. How have recent
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The past twenty years have seen a spike in the interest in art and science collaborations. Partly because of the resonance of the posthuman cyborg in the ontological turn; partly because of the rise of BioArt; perhaps because of the... more
The past twenty years have seen a spike in the interest in art and science collaborations. Partly because of the resonance of the posthuman cyborg in the ontological turn; partly because of the rise of BioArt; perhaps because of the prominence that multidisciplinarity has acquired in academia; and surely in light of our fraught relationship with our environment and climate change, the intersections of art and science have recently become more complexly defined by new ethics, politics, aesthetics, and poetics. Far from celebrating " art and science " as an unproblematic field of enquiry, the two issues of Antennae resulting from this CFP will focus on the challenges, compatibilities and productivities posed by multidisciplinarity, accessibility, epistemology, methodologies, empiricism, and speculative philosophy. This project is co-edited in collaboration with American artist and philosopher Jonathon Keats whose bold experiments raise serious questions and put into practice his conviction that the world needs more "curious amateurs," willing to explore publicly whatever intrigues them, in defiance of a culture that increasingly forecloses on wonder and silos knowledge into narrowly defined areas of expertise. The first issue will be dedicated to the notion of " Interface " and the second to " Experiment ". As both themes are open to interpretation, we invite artists, scholars and other creative thinkers to position their contribution within the concerns of current discourses and practices.
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The past fifteen years have seen an unexpected resurgence of taxidermy in popular culture — from hip restaurants and bars to interior design and movies. However this phenomenon has been counterposed by the simultaneous dismantling of... more
The past fifteen years have seen an unexpected resurgence of taxidermy in popular culture — from hip restaurants and bars to interior design and movies. However this phenomenon has been counterposed by the simultaneous dismantling of dioramas in natural history museums in light of a postcolonial critical reappraisal of the practice, predominantly contextualizing taxidermy as the negative by-product of Victorian-era colonization. It is clear that utopian positivistic visions of that time and the imperialist economies of power, subjugation, and wealth indeed contributed to the emergence of taxidermy. However, between this negative positioning of its historical past and the renewed ‘hype’ it has found in popular culture, lies the emergence of taxidermy in the contemporary exhibition space. This thesis focuses on the latter phenomenon, questioning the problematic and uncomfortable encounters with manipulated animal bodies that seemingly return, along with our shared histories, to haunt us. Taking Steve Baker’s landmark theorization of the postmodern animal as a starting point, and more specifically concentrating on the ‘botched taxidermy’ strand of his thought, this thesis focuses on a selection of works by contemporary artists Gerard Richter, Roni Horn, Jordan Baseman, and Steve Bishop. Situated across the disciplines of animal studies, Foucault studies, and visual cultures, this inquiry focuses on how the differential specificities of mediums such as photography, painting, and sculpture in some instances provide a productive opportunity to rethink human/animal relations through art. To support this analysis, and departing from the frame offered by Baker, this thesis also provides a new critique of Foucault’s fragmentary work on painting and photography. It thus expands his unfinished project to adapt genealogical and biopolitical frameworks to visual analysis. More broadly, this thesis grounds current posthumanist debates in the definitive movements of contemporary art.
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ABSTRACT This paper looks at the past ten years of art practice informed by the human–animal studies agenda in order to assess what has been thus far achieved and which issues may become central to the future artistic debate. It is... more
ABSTRACT This paper looks at the past ten years of art practice informed by the human–animal studies agenda in order to assess what has been thus far achieved and which issues may become central to the future artistic debate. It is divided into two main sections: the first takes into consideration four pivotal works of art produced during the past decade in order to focus on the human–animal related concerns art has thus far helped to explore; the second looks at the future, mainly posing key questions about traditional forms of representation, asking what naturalism may or may not have left to offer. “Is there any space for traditional representation in the new and challenging panorama outlined by human–animal studies?” This question is not so much posed in a conservative way, but it instead constitutes an invitation to reconsider the boundaries that may have so far defined the production of art within the remit of human–animal studies. This line of questioning leads to a discussion on the value and essence of the “commonplace” as a productive agent that may in the future play a pivotal role in art for the purpose of making the current discourse accessible to wider audiences.
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ABSTRACT Do works of art involving the killing of animals speak about animality or more about the artist who stages the killing? Where do we draw a line? In 2006, the semi-nal book 'Killing Animals', written by... more
ABSTRACT Do works of art involving the killing of animals speak about animality or more about the artist who stages the killing? Where do we draw a line? In 2006, the semi-nal book 'Killing Animals', written by The Animal Studies Group, explored the ways in which societies past ...
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... Marcus Coates Nicolas Primat/Patrick Munck, Portrait de Famille, 2004, video still, photography and Photoshop Giovanni Aloi; © Primat/Munck Eduardo Kac ... time and care in offering advice in relation to my work on this book: many... more
... Marcus Coates Nicolas Primat/Patrick Munck, Portrait de Famille, 2004, video still, photography and Photoshop Giovanni Aloi; © Primat/Munck Eduardo Kac ... time and care in offering advice in relation to my work on this book: many thanks to Steve Baker, Rod Bennison, Ron ...
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Art History, Art, Plant Ecology, Architecture, Posthumanism, and 15 moreVisual Culture, Race and Racism, Social Representations, African Diaspora Studies, Colonialism, Music and identity, Italy, Palms, Urban Green Space, Banana, History of Milan, Bananas, Critical Plant Studies, Postcolonialism, and Post Colonialism
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Geology and SHELF LIFE
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Sociology, Publishing, Politics, Silence, Civilization, and 4 moreAnthropocene, Brill, Botanical Garden, and Mainstream
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The resulting series of events, Animal Influence, engaged with the work and thinking of digital media artists whose work has been influenced by the growing wealth of knowledge on animal agency, cognition, creativity and consciousness... more
The resulting series of events, Animal Influence, engaged with the work and thinking of digital media artists whose work has been influenced by the growing wealth of knowledge on animal agency, cognition, creativity and consciousness emerging from such fields as ecology, cognitive ethology (the study of animal thinking, consciousness and mind), psychology, neuroscience, cognitive science, philosophy, zoology, and others.
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... Marcus Coates Nicolas Primat/Patrick Munck, Portrait de Famille, 2004, video still, photography and Photoshop Giovanni Aloi; © Primat/Munck Eduardo Kac ... time and care in offering advice in relation to my work on this book: many... more
... Marcus Coates Nicolas Primat/Patrick Munck, Portrait de Famille, 2004, video still, photography and Photoshop Giovanni Aloi; © Primat/Munck Eduardo Kac ... time and care in offering advice in relation to my work on this book: many thanks to Steve Baker, Rod Bennison, Ron ...
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Art History and Art
This essay addresses the growing importance of materiality in relation to posthumanist discourses in contemporary art. It traces a geneaology of materiality in the hiostories of classical, modern, and contenporary art to explain how the... more
This essay addresses the growing importance of materiality in relation to posthumanist discourses in contemporary art. It traces a geneaology of materiality in the hiostories of classical, modern, and contenporary art to explain how the recent philosophical waves of Object Oriented Ontology and New Materialism have substantially shifted attention to new materialist conception of matter as recalcitrant: a subversion of the traditional definitions of agency, resistance, and power in art. From this perspective, materiality becomes a provocative ontological problematizer, mapping a dimension of undeniable bio-traces that relentlessly gesture towards new and urgent registers of ethical realism. It is in this sense, that art with a posthumanist focus considers the corporeality and the place of embodied humans and animals within a material world defined by interconnectedness of bio-and eco-spheres. *** Durante il secolo scorso la collusione fra arte e filosofia si è intensificata a tal pun...
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Art History, Plant Ecology, Architecture, Posthumanism, Visual Culture, and 15 moreRace and Racism, Social Representations, African Diaspora Studies, Colonialism, Music and identity, Italy, Visual Cultures, Palms, Urban Green Space, Banana, History of Milan, Bananas, Critical Plant Studies, Postcolonialism, and Post Colonialism
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ABSTRACT Do works of art involving the killing of animals speak about animality or more about the artist who stages the killing? Where do we draw a line? In 2006, the semi-nal book 'Killing Animals', written by... more
ABSTRACT Do works of art involving the killing of animals speak about animality or more about the artist who stages the killing? Where do we draw a line? In 2006, the semi-nal book 'Killing Animals', written by The Animal Studies Group, explored the ways in which societies past ...
Speculative Phytopoetics: Towards Vegetal Kinship How can art help us sidestep capitalist strategies of vegetal objectification and commodification? For too long, the presence of plants in the gallery space has been intended as a... more
Speculative Phytopoetics: Towards Vegetal Kinship
How can art help us sidestep capitalist strategies of vegetal objectification and commodification?
For too long, the presence of plants in the gallery space has been intended as a humorous counterpoint to the serious rationality of the white cube. Most often, they have been brought into the exhibiting space to metaphorically offset the timelessness of man-made artworks and our obsession with purity and preservation. At other times they have posed as tokens of nature—that which can only truly exist outside the culturally defined perimeter of the gallery. But since the beginning of the new millennium, plants in art have come to mean so much more. The slowing down, the mindfulness, and the presence we experience upon encountering a work of art in the gallery space, or a plant presented as a work of art, lie at the heart of what I call 'speculative phytopoetics': the potential for a fuller world in which we make efforts to meet the non-human halfway instead of repressing it or erasing it. Speculative phytopoetics requires closeness, constancy, patience, and determination. It is a set of non-verbal, non-written biosemiotic codes we develop with individual plants in our homes. It constitutes the perceptible framework of the plant identity—an identity dispersed among branches and leaves and extended across the geography of the domestic space they share with us. Ultimately, speculative phytopoetics is an immanent model of vegetal/human, empathy-based engagement derived from the relational modalities of contemporary art that enables us to reclaim plants from the cultural objectification of capitalism.
How can art help us sidestep capitalist strategies of vegetal objectification and commodification?
For too long, the presence of plants in the gallery space has been intended as a humorous counterpoint to the serious rationality of the white cube. Most often, they have been brought into the exhibiting space to metaphorically offset the timelessness of man-made artworks and our obsession with purity and preservation. At other times they have posed as tokens of nature—that which can only truly exist outside the culturally defined perimeter of the gallery. But since the beginning of the new millennium, plants in art have come to mean so much more. The slowing down, the mindfulness, and the presence we experience upon encountering a work of art in the gallery space, or a plant presented as a work of art, lie at the heart of what I call 'speculative phytopoetics': the potential for a fuller world in which we make efforts to meet the non-human halfway instead of repressing it or erasing it. Speculative phytopoetics requires closeness, constancy, patience, and determination. It is a set of non-verbal, non-written biosemiotic codes we develop with individual plants in our homes. It constitutes the perceptible framework of the plant identity—an identity dispersed among branches and leaves and extended across the geography of the domestic space they share with us. Ultimately, speculative phytopoetics is an immanent model of vegetal/human, empathy-based engagement derived from the relational modalities of contemporary art that enables us to reclaim plants from the cultural objectification of capitalism.