Artistic Practices, Discursive Contexts and Environmental Humanities in the Age of the Anthropocene

The hypothesis of the Anthropocene signals human activity, particularly the social, political and economic sphere, as the new biogeophysical force whose impact allows the scientific community to speak about a new era in the geological time-scale. The assertion of the abandonment of the Holocene implies not only access to a new physical, but also a cultural space that has not yet been experienced. However, while contributions from the field of natural sciences to the analysis of the phenomenon have been significant, literature generated from the Humanities and Social Sciences shows that much work remains to be done. In this current scenario where increased global connectivity operates as the ground for interconnected large-scale risks and shocks, we are compelled to take into account transversal thinking across different ideas, meanings and fields that can help understanding the social, the economic and the political relations at stake. Drawing from recent investigations from the field of Environmental Humanities, this paper explores the role of artistic, theoretical and curatorial practice in understanding, conforming and interrogating our position in the world under the conditions of the Anthropocene. It shall do this by focusing on the analysis of projects gathered in the group exhibition 7 MIL MILLONES (EACC Castelló, 2014) as a case study. We argue that experimental artistic practice – which emphasizes a new combination of aesthetics and ethics and the ecological and the social – can provide interesting models in helping societies adapt to this new territory. We finally suggest that the curatorial statement fails to address the complex critical potential of the gathered projects insofar as it constrains the theoretical context to a particular classical formulation 81 Artistic Practices, Discursive Contexts and Environmental Humanities... of sustainable development and an omission of their consideration as artifacts for political imagination.

Palabras clave sociedades del Antropoceno, ecosofía, sostenibilidad, ecología cultural, estética medioambiental, ambientalismo poscolonial 1. The Anthropocene described by natural scientists One can observe an increased awareness of the human impact on ecosystems or, to put it differently, of the shift from a global system dominated by nature to a world dominated by humans. In the field of natural sciences, this impact has been described from late 18th century as the "antropozoic era" proposed by Italian geologist Stoppani, later as 'noosphere', 'anthroposphere' and recently major efforts have been taken place in order to reach a consensus in formalizing the thesis of the Anthropocene (Steffen et al., 2011). Developed by Paul Crutzen and Eugene Stoermer, the hypothesis of the Anthropocene signals human activity as the new biogeophysiscal force whose impact allows the scientific community to speak about a new era in the geological time-scale. The environmental turn which this thesis describes has been analyzed in terms of scale and magnitude of ocean alteration, transformations in earth biosphere, carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere, and raising temperatures . 1 The presence of this data has even allowed scientists to formulate a stratigraphy of the Anthropocene. Crutzen places the beginning of this new geological era at the end of the 18th century and as being primarily caused by the effect of burning fossil fuels in the atmosphere on a global scale. According to theory, a more severe second phase of the Anthopocene known as "The Great Acceleration" -characterized by key factors as increased world population, the implementation of neo-liberal economic systems, atomic testing, and a dramatic increase of carbon dioxide levelshas taken place from Second World War up to now (Steffen et al., 2011, pp. 849-853).
In either case, the most relevant point is that this theory assigns human impact at least as much importance and force as the main natural forces -solar influence, volcanic activity, extraterrestrial asteroid impacts and natural selection -in terms of responsibility for global environmental change. The theory identifies a multiplicity of evidences that support the presumption of the abandonment of the Holocene, the previous interglacial epoch that emerged 11,784 years ago. This level of human imprint has been similarly identified in the fields of ecology and biology in shaping the so-called humandominated habitats and "novel ecosystems". 2 They argue that natural and human-influenced systems cannot be conceived as separate anymore (Corlett, 2014, pp. 36-41).

The need for interdisciplinary approach within Humanities and Social Sciences
Climate breakdown, however, comes paired with no less urgent questions that exceed the natural sciences disciplinary boundaries. Indeed, the Anthropocene describes an environmental turn that coexists with energetic, financial-systemic, food and humanitarian crises. In fact, what is more striking is that this hypothesis points to human behaviour, particularly the social, political and economic sphere as the main driver of the change. However, whereas contributions from the field of Natural Sciences have been significant, relevant literature generated from the Humanities and Social Sciences remains proportionately lacking. In order to tackle this urgent task, human scientists will have to ask themselves, as theoretician Tobias Boes does, how can we experience ourselves as a species having geophysical and biochemical impact upon the planet? Certainly, as Boes notes, what we desperately need "are a set of hermeneutics and poetics (a theory of understanding and a theory of expression) that might accompany the scientific study of the changing Earth system" (Boes, 2014, p. 168). The article "Reconceptualizing the 'Anthropos' in the Anthropocene: Integrating the Social Sciences and Humanities in Global Environmental Change Research" (Palsson, 2012) is perhaps the most systematic up-to-date study on contributions made from the Human and Social Sciences to the analysis of the emergent questions which arise in the age of Anthropocene. This text attempts to relocate as well as redefine the decentred human being -in the sense of its separateness from nature -in a map from which it was once erased by humanist ideology. The study provides a genealogy of contributions to the discussion and takes steps to draft a program for research within the Humanities and Social Sciences that can help us face these urgent individual and collective challenges.
The first mental disposition from this approach would consist of understanding the environment as a social category. Secondly, planetary boundaries -comprised by loss of biodiversity, the effect of nitrogen and phosphorous cycle, climate crisis, ocean acidification, chemical and particle atmospheric pollution, deforestation and freshwater use -must be directly linked to the human experience, and must be placed in a more specific frame that includes notions of distribution, geography, equity, and a consideration of the environmental effects on humans in a local / global context. Thirdly, we must individually and collectively articulate societies of the 1. The term was coined by Nobel Prize on Atmospheric Chemistry Paul Crutzen in 2002. Since then the hypothesis about a new global era has been debated firstly from the field of geology and more specifically from a group of researchers working in the context of The Royal Society in London 2. Novel ecosystems is "a unique assemblage of biota and environmental conditions that are the direct result of intentional or unintentional alteration by humans, i.e., human agency, sufficient to cross an ecological threshold that facilitates a new ecosystem trajectory and inhibits its return to a previous trajectory regardless of additional human intervention". Antropocene on the basis of a reformulated linkage with democracy, promoting a new combination of the natural and the ideal in an interdisciplinary way, and transforming contemporary syndromes of anxiety in a more positive task of attempting to construct a culture of sustainability. This would be implemented in the search of new technologies, medical knowledge, and new ideas about social and economic models. Finally, we must explore diverse ways in which western thought can confront its limits in order to adapt to the new condition of the Anthropocene, overcoming the polarization of nature and culture (Palsson et al., 2012, p. 11). This research primarily expresses a whole new way of reading the world: one that is based on systemic thinking that focuses on the flow of things and thoughts in the analysis of interactions between material and cultural processes; an ontological and epistemological project that investigates the so-called "ecological interdependency" from the fields of anthropology, linguistics, sociology, philosophy and psychology, and more specifically from the domain of systems theory, psycoanalysis, sociology of science and speculative realism (Bateson, 1972;Guattari, 1989;Latour, 2004;Timothy Morton, 2004). It contributes to a fruitful body of theory that can be considered as a sort of "anthropogenic ecosophy" that traces a mesh of unseen connections between climate science, ecology, politics, economy, international institutions and global governance in the understanding of the novel, global and fluid risks posed by the Anthropocene.

The role of artistic practice
From the field of artistic practice and visual culture, a great number of projects that reflect on the new condition of Anthropocene societies have emerged in recent years focusing on a new combination of aesthetics and ethics, the ecological and the social, suggesting new considerations between the human and non-human as well as objects and experiences. Recognizing the limits of artistic representation of the Anthropocene -equally ungraspable as it is for natural scientists in demarcating its actors -one finds that these projects provide a sensory experience of a new way of thinking and inhabiting the world. Within the field of art history and cultural theory, the analysis of the role of this sort of politico-ecological aesthetics within the parameters of this new space have been anticipated by T.J. Demos in his writings about contemporary art and the politics of ecology (Demos, 2014(Demos, , 2013(Demos, , 2012(Demos, , 2009). Demos provide a fecund theoretical and critical framework that helps in analyzing the emerging field of art practice related to the Anthropocene through the identification of an overarching criteria as well as the critical positions of the projects: "broadly speaking, then, the present and ongoing challenge is to reunite a critical environmentalism with an ecologically attendant postcolonialism, engendering a political ecology based on the commitment to environmental sustainability, biodiversity, social justice, human rights, economic equality and democratic practice" (Demos, 2013, p. 7). These critical baseswhich acknowledge the legacy of Félix Guattari's "Ecosophy", Bruno Latour's "Politics of Nature", Neil Smith's Cultural Geography and Vandana Shiva's postcolonialism and rights-of-nature approachoffer a fertile ground from which to address the complexity of the artistic and curatorial practices that ponder the challenges of the Anthropocene.
The proliferation of these practices is expressed in the great number of exhibitions focusing on the theme. Among the most prominent we can highlight those that reflect on the interrelated social, political and economic links that define the very notion of the Anthropocene which help visualize the relations of the systemic thinking it invokes, such as The Anthropocene (Deustches Museum, München, 2013-14) 3 The Anthropocene Observatory (Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin, 2013-14) 4 or Systémique -Think global, act local (CEAAC Strasbourg, 2015). 5 Others revolve around the current social, political and cultural crises, and the relation between humans and non-humans through the works and the initiatives of artists, political activists and indigenous people, such as Rights of Nature. Arts and Ecology in the Americas (Nottingham Contemporary, United Kingdom, 2015). 6 Whereas others show collaborative practices with which to physically transform ecologies and politics creatively, such as Ecovention: Current Art to Transform Ecologies, 7 or Groundworks: Environmental Collaboration in Contemporary Art. 8 Others develop strategies related to recycling, communitarian activism, research on new sustainable fuels and alternative land used through industrial design, such as Beyond Green: Toward a Sustainable Art (Chicago, 2005). 9 Others explore the complex and changing relationship of humans with the natural world by analyzing the political dimensions, for example Like a Bird: Certain exhibitions manage to monitor the strategic capability of capitalism to absorb green rhetoric for economic interests or to appropriate and manipulate genetic and biological resources, such as Greenwashing: Environment, Perils, Promises, and Perplexities, 12 Biopiracy, 13 or Alter Natur. 14 We could trace another segment of exhibitions that gather projects lying within the domain of the utopian, whose claims restore the capability of imagining alternative futures to the dystopian ones, like Brave New Worlds (Minneapolis: Walker Art Center, 2007) 15 o Futurs Abandonats. Demà ja Era la Qüestió (Fabra i Coats, Barcelona, 2014). 16 The subject even became the central theme of international events such as the 9th Taipei Biennale entitled The Great Acceleration (Taipei Fine Arts Museum, 2015). 17 Some of these concerns can be located in the projects of the artists that were included in the exhibition 7 MIL MILLONES ("Seven billion", referring to the average population of human beings inhabiting the earth) hosted at EACC (Espai d'Art Contemporani de Castelló), Castelló (País Valencià, Spain) in 2014. According to the curators David Arlandis and Javier Marroquí, the exhibition starts from the premise of "sustainable development" formulated by former Norwegian Prime Minister Gro Bruntland, whose utterances are quoted in the catalogue as the "development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs". Published in 1987 in the frame of the United Nations World Commission on Environment and Development (WCED) and known as Our Common Future or Bruntland Report, Arlandis and Marroquí note that any political agenda or action plan had to be articulated or driven by the triangle of sustainability (economic, social and environmental) ever since.
They acknowledge that over time, "there has been a certain perversion of the uses of the expression due to the fact that it's been frequently reduced to its environmental aspect or to the relation between ecology and economy" and that "it is increasingly more evident that the current system is no longer capable of evolving positively in a local or global scale". For this reason they address the need for the rise of "new models of development which will have to show themselves more sustainable than the prevailing ones" (Arlandis, Marroquí, 2014, p. 6). As stated by the curators, these models "will have to be necessarily based on a wider understanding of human activity, and will have to address life as a whole". In line with the postulates of Hardt and Negri's biopolitics, seven billion bodies simultaneously become territories for domination as well as resistance. They are subjects and starting points from which to "act, rehearse alternatives and propose distinct social forms" (Arlandis, Marroquí, 2014, p.12).
Among the projects displayed, we can highlight The Radiant, a video essay by the collective The Otolith group (2012) that investigates the aftermath of March 11, 2011, when the Tohoku earthquake triggered a tsunami that caused the collapse of the nuclear power plant Fukushima Daichii I in Japan, killing more than 15,000 people, injuring more than 3,000 and leaving 5,000 people missing. By combining historical documents such as film footage, television broadcasts and recordings of interviews with scientists, residents and activists, the film resurrects the promise of nuclear power that dominated the narratives after the Second World War. They bring it back to a present dominated by "necropolitics of radiation" and governmentality of death -as the collective say-thus interrogating it by provoking a critical dislocation in time and space.
Egyptian Chemistry by Ursula Biemann (2012) reflects on the role of the Nile river in the configuration of the economy and Egyptian society, addressing the profound impact in a molecular scale that caused the alteration of its course by hydraulic engineering projects and the use of synthetic fertilizers. These instances have added up to the rural activism regarding human forces that affect its complex ecologies, formed by a structure of organic, social, technological and chemical processes that account for the relations between vision, productivity, nature, engineering, resistance and revolution.
Exceeding Two Degrees is a project by Tue Greenfort previously featured in Sharjah Biennale, for which the artist negotiated with the institution the lowering 2ºC of the building's heating system for the four months the exhibition was on. The resulting savings were invested in the reforestation of the Amazon through the acquisition of a parcel of land in collaboration with the Nepenthes organization. The decision of decreasing it by two degrees is related to the conclusions of the Stern Report (2006), which forecasted that if no effective action was taken regarding carbon dioxide emissions there would be a probability of 75% that global temperature would increase 2ºC within the following 50 years.
Defiende el Territorio desde el Aire ("Defending Territory from Air") is the title of the project for which the artist collective Basurama collaborated with local communities in the development of an aerial cartography which mapped the metabolism of the city of Castelló with the help of free-license tools provided by The Public Laboratory, a non-profit organization that develops and applies open-source tools to environmental exploration and investigation. Video-blog Radical Ecology and Tender Gardening by Johan Grimonprez tackles the notion of sustainability from the perspective of a wide social angle. Divided in 6 categories (Biotecture, Guerilla Gardening, Transition World, Radical Ecology, Off the Grid and Education), the project constitutes an online visual as well as textual archive hosted on YouTube that provides tools and materials for the development of political imagination.
Time / Bank by Julieta Aranda and Anton Vidokle proposes an alternative economic system managed by local communities based on an understanding of hours of work and skills as a bargaining chip. What is interesting about this barter system is that it arises from a social structure rather than an economic or financial society, it fosters the cultural value of a model that goes far beyond the capital, speculation, market value, commercial, rules, and avoids accumulation. The project formalizes itself as an installation and the establishment of a branch that aims to create a user's community that will interact with organizations with the same communal spirit.
Oficina de Rescate Invertido ("Inverted Rescue Office") by artist Núria Güell, is a project that helps citizens to recover the money evaded by banks or administrations through the articulation of small financial strategies such as how to organize if you are debtor with unaffordable mortgages, how to develop mechanisms of insubordination regarding VAT or how to declare yourself financially disobedient to make yourself insolvent. 18 The free-advice provided at a consultation office available throughout the exhibition dates was given by an activist who worked in close collaboration with activists and local collectives. In a society deeply troubled by a systemic crisis -and not a crisis of the real economy -that condemned citizens to "poverty, to the impoverishment of life's conditions, to the dismantling of public services, to family instability, to the loss of future, to the consumption of anxiolytics and to the decadence of democracy" 19 trough corruption and the pillaging of public wealth, this gesture aimed to guide citizens in reappropriating resources with the articulation of mechanisms that reproduce the 'social engineering' executed by the State and the Banking sector, but in this case applied towards them.
This project represents a shift from eco-criticism to eco-action through the instigation of radical mobilization (radical in terms of going back to the crux or the root of the problem) by exercising an active counter-narrative which is involved in the (re)construction or (re)storation of communities' basic conditions of life through methodologies of popular agency.
However, despite the alleged sustainable ethics 7 MIL MILLONES promotes, one could say there are certain inconsistencies in the curatorial approach that destabilizes its conceptual rigor. These basically come from three aspects. First and foremost, from a classical formulation of sustainable development they subscribe to, secondly, a particular image of a monumentalized humanity they picture, and thirdly, an omission of the practical, speculative and metaphoric dimensions of the projects and thus an omission of their consideration of artifacts for political imagination.
As the curators state, the projects "rehearse social, economic and environmental forms" they locate the curatorial statement at the centre of a triangular prism constrained by the economic, social and environmental sustainability outlined by the traditional notion of sustainable development. And from here emerges a risk of undermining the critical potential of the projects: in fact, curators omit that the needs the sustainable development notion is referring to, are economic needs of developed countries over developing ones. Similarly, curators have nothing to say about the environmental, social and political impact of the dependency of developed countries over the global south regarding the relatively recent displacement of industrial pollution from richer countries to the poorer ones.
On the other hand, this particular conception of the "Seven Billion" as the constituents of this "great scenario of production" of these worlds, visualizes the troupe of a mythical community: a notion of an inclusive collectivity, exempt from inequalities that parallel the very terminological vagueness that neoliberal politics relies on. Indeed, this idea is as naïve as the conception of nature as a pacifying and unifying entity, a conception which has been colonizing the collective consciousness as Bruno Latour notes (Latour, 2014, p. 20). This reference to the agency of a homogeneous, static, totalizing universal community resurrects the deceptive appeal of imperialistinflected "Earthrise" and "Blue Marble" extraterrestrial photographs of the earth taken by Apollo 8 (1968) and Apollo 17 (1972) mission, which were conceived to "chart the disappearance of the outside and to advocate for wilderness areas in the Global South as a cultural heritage of mankind" (Lekan, 2014, p. 171). 20 This sense of a unity and global connectivity these photographs brought about, -which in the end were vivid representations of a great narrative-has now become obsolete.

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In order to avoid this monopolizing approach exempt of differences, which is the product of this social engineering noted by Güell, will necessarily require an unravelling in the shades of meaning, revealing the ideology hidden in the very discourse of development, which is no other than the discourse of contemporary art. Formulating an alternative definition that links environmental with social, climatic, water justice that could demonstrate the mechanisms of capitalism and could (re)appropriate life "in all respects", should be the imperative of artistic, theoretical and curatorial practice, devoted to exploring the notions of ecology and environment in the present time.
Given the premise that infinite growth is not possible in a finiteresource planet, art and design can help us in imagining more resilient societies through the engendering of new models of individual resistance, collective alternatives and political decisions. In doing so, it turns a dystopian future into a speculative pragmatism that will shift from critique to proposition (Hlavajova, 2014). The main challenge of cultural institutions such as museums, that value objects will in turn, consist of giving them rich or broader historical, theoretical and critical context. Certainly, the new thinking constellation that the concept of the Anthropocene suggests, invites us first of all to widen or expand our notions of time and scale, but letting the practice of representation give way to the articulation of methodology in the course of unfolding our decisions.