"The Death of Nature"

"The Death of Nature" is a book by Carolyn Merchant (1980).

The book is about people turning toward a mechanistic view of nature - esp. in the 1600s. The founding of the microscope was one element. People gaining more of an understanding of how nature works. Prior to the microscope - the general idea in the West was that in reproduction women contributed matter, while men (supposedly being superior) contributed "spirit" or "energy". It might have partly been a result of men falling off the pedestal they created for themselves that contributed to the shift.

Prior to that - nature was thought of in more anthropomorphical terms - as "Mother Nature", "Mother Earth". And people had more concern over the consequences of extracting resources. As if it would hurt the earth. Ecological concerns go way back hundreds of years to when people were polluting rivers from iron making and one thing or another. There have always been those who were disturbed by damage to natural environment.

In the 1600s - one of the main power sources was lumber - turned into ships that then could travel around the world in trade or in aids to war. The toll on the trees in England and in France became a concern and conservation measures had to be implemented.

Also - industries were polluting England so much that some were sent over to New England - much like Americans have sent industries to Mexico or China.

But the main idea was the problem of a mechanized world view and the subsequent lack of concern for the environment. It became easier for people to think of the earth as resources to extract, to make money from. The idea that people could have control over nature - that order and power could be imposed. The more people thought of nature in those terms - the easier it was to exploit.

There were some who wanted to hold on to ideas that matter was one thing - but spirit and God were another. Even Newton - with his scientific understanding didn't want to let go of God completely. There seemed to be a sort of balance that people wanted to adopt - the mechanistic world - that God WANTED people to exploit - to control. This allowed people to feel OK about what they were doing with their capitalistic endeavors.

Even today - the concept that this world is a temporary world on one's way to paradise is a way to allow people to muck up the earth - because it doesn't really matter - it's "Fallen", anyway.

If people can realize that this world is absolutely awesome - those who live here now (or at any time) should feel compelled to keep it that way for future generations. No generation of people should ever figure that THEY have the right to live in luxury while destroying the planet for the future. That would be a big step. It doesn't require that people believe or don't believe in God - it just requires that everyone realizes how awesome the world is - and that nobody would want to screw it up for others alive now or later.

Everyone should be able to accept that global warming, pollution, etc. will affect everyone. While it will hurt some more than others - no-one should figure that they can stay above the fray. We are all in this together.

Jane Ingram Allen

Still Water
No Water
Every Drop Counts

Jane Ingram Allen and Marcia Widenor had a show at the Tenri Cultural Institute last May.

I especially like Jane's works. She uses handmade paper and wildflowers. She has had art residencies in Taiwan and Tanzania that have informed her work. And she incorporates ecological concerns into what she does.

On her website, she describes her work at the Tenri Gallery like this:

...One of the works "Still Water" was made during her recent artist in residency at Taipei National University of the Arts in collaboration with art students at the university. This installation is made up of 200 cast handmade paper water bottles with unique labels created by the students and arranged in a spiral configuration on the gallery walls recalling the trash vortex in the North Pacific and relating to problems of plastic trash in the world's oceans as well as the lack of pure drinking water.

Another installation titled "No Water" is made with handmade paper from plants of Africa created during Jane's January-February 2008 residency in Tanzania, Africa. This work refers to the lack of water in many parts of Africa and problems relating to global climate change. The installation "Falling Water" consists of 10 panels of handmade paper cascading from floor to ceiling. This paper pulp is colored with non-toxic dye and painted with Chinese ink and contains seeds for wildflowers.

Another installation in the exhibition is called "Every Drop Counts" and consists of many handmade paper drops arranged on the gallery wall like water drops on a window. The paper pulp contains seeds for wild flowers and visitors are invited to pledge to conserve water and then take a drop from this installation home with them to water and plant to grow as wildflowers. The installations in the exhibition of handmade paper with wildflowers seeds in the pulp will be recycled into the earth after the exhibition to come back as living blooming wildflowers.

"Running the Numbers"

This is pretty cool artwork by Chris Jordan @ chrisjordan.com - attempting to show the quantity of consumption in this country... (cross posted at Universal Jellyfish )


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First image depicts two million plastic beverage bottles, the number used in the US every five minutes - 60x120"- /second a detail.
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An American Self-Portrait

This series looks at contemporary American culture through the austere lens of statistics. Each image portrays a specific quantity of something: fifteen million sheets of office paper (five minutes of paper use); 106,000 aluminum cans (thirty seconds of can consumption) and so on. My hope is that images representing these quantities might have a different effect than the raw numbers alone, such as we find daily in articles and books. Statistics can feel abstract and anesthetizing, making it difficult to connect with and make meaning of 3.6 million SUV sales in one year, for example, or 2.3 million Americans in prison, or 410,000 paper cups used every fifteen minutes. This project visually examines these vast and bizarre measures of our society, in large intricately detailed prints assembled from thousands of smaller photographs. The underlying desire is to emphasize the role of the individual in a society that is increasingly enormous, incomprehensible, and overwhelming.

My only caveat about this series is that the prints must be seen in person to be experienced the way they are intended. As with any large artwork, their scale carries a vital part of their substance which is lost in these little web images. Hopefully the JPEGs displayed here might be enough to arouse your curiosity to attend an exhibition, or to arrange one if you are in a position to do so. The series is a work in progress, and new images will be posted as they are completed, so please stay tuned.

~chris jordan, Seattle, 2007

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Some of his other images:

Plastic Cups, "Depicts one million plastic cups, the number used on airline flights in the US every six hours."

Barbie Dolls, "Depicts 32,000 Barbies, equal to the number of elective breast augmentation surgeries performed monthly in the US in 2006."

Plastic Bags, "Depicts 60,000 plastic bags, the number used in the US every five seconds."

Handguns, "Depicts 29,569 handguns, equal to the number of gun-related deaths in the US in 2004."

Cigarettes, "Depicts 65,000 cigarettes, equal to the number of American teenagers under age eighteen who become addicted to cigarettes every month."

Paper Cups, "Depicts 410,000 paper cups, equal to the number of disposable hot-beverage paper cups used in the US every fifteen minutes."

Cans Seurat, "Depicts 106,000 aluminum cans, the number used in the US every thirty seconds."

Crocheting a Coral Reef

I love this project, Want to Save a Coral Reef? Bring Along Your Crochet Needles, described by PATRICIA COHEN for the New York Times (also posted at UNIVERSAL JELLYFISH). It's a great example of taking a traditionally women's creative activity and turning it on it's head for social activism and commentary.

One thing that is great about it is for it to make an effective statement - it takes many people to be involved.

I never learned how to crochet - but this project has me wanting to learn. (I do a very little knitting - enough to be able to make scarves and that's it).

Crochet seems to be the perfect thing for this - for creating the shapes of coral and sea urchins and such, and for getting people involved in an issue (the destruction on coral reefs through global warming, industrial fishing, carelessness, etc.) that may not have been aware.

(I also like how the photo goes with my color scheme :)