Ecological artist David Haley is a Visiting Professor at Zhongyuan University of Technology. He is a Director of Chrysalis Arts Development, Vice Chair of the CIWEM Art
This paper is by way of an initial attempt to articulate a set of thoughts that are still emergen... more This paper is by way of an initial attempt to articulate a set of thoughts that are still emergent. These thoughts are concerned with artists working in public life. They are concerned with the form of research that artists do. They are concerned with the uses of knowledge. Greenhouse Britain: Losing Ground, Gaining Wisdom (2005-2008) was undertaken by Helen Mayer Harrison, Newton Harrison (the Harrisons) and David Haley, and which I joined as producer. More generally I tend to describe myself as a producer and researcher. The research word has a number of uses and I am going to try and make a little sense of them first by identifying the various individual relationships with research. Helen Mayer Harrison and Newton Harrison are Professors Emeritus of the University of California at San Diego, and have been involved in research on at least two levels for much of their career. Greenhouse Britain is typical of their work (as well as the work of David Haley) in that it involved workin...
A Walk on the Wild Side: Steps towards an ecological arts pedagogy
International Journal of Education Through Art
between home and school walking a way to learning life through the city. (David Haley) This artic... more between home and school walking a way to learning life through the city. (David Haley) This article takes the reader for a stroll through a programme of ecological arts-led, performance-based research. The style is more poetic than scientific, although much ecological science is embedded within the art form. Indeed, Charles Darwin was known for his regular walks, as time and space for his reflections on evolution and his grandfather Erasmus Darwin was noted for the poetic form of his scientific treatises. Here also, the author breaks with academic convention to engage with walking and research as creative activities to deal with ecological issues. Of course, other artists like Richard Long and Hamish Fulton have walked as part of their practice, and there are a growing number of artists who consider walking as practice-as-research. In this article, the focus is specifically on walking as a creative form of inquiry, through community participation within urban contexts to create a cr...
O Brave New World": A Change in the Weather
On the W@terfront, 2000
The concept of "Waterfronts" becomes a powerful poetic metaphor. A point of departure a... more The concept of "Waterfronts" becomes a powerful poetic metaphor. A point of departure and arrival in understanding arts practises. The ebb and flow between definitions of Nature and Culture. The littoral from which evolutionary transition is made. Referencing The Tempest by William Shakespeare (1564 -1616) some paintings by Turner and the drawings of Leonardo da Vinci (1452 - 1519), this presentation considers how Public Art in the context of urban and social development may start to engage the issue of Climate Change. It will also explore our relationship with water from different perspectives, as a learning process.
Climate Change and species extinction are perhaps two symptoms of a psychotic society that has lo... more Climate Change and species extinction are perhaps two symptoms of a psychotic society that has lost contact with reality. The pandemic pathology of economic and industrial values have possibly altered the very course of planetary evolution. As humankind starts to recognize that apocalyptic change is imminent, the practice of art(s) may be an essential discipline to emerge beyond collapse. This paper considers art in an ecological context to help us ‘see anew’ the potential for adopting complex ways of thinking, and ‘transdisciplinary’ ways of working. Challenging existing belief systems and normative ways of thinking through ‘question-based learning’, we may consider drawing as a means of gaining insights and practical approaches to diverse futures. ‘Turning the face of disaster to the face of opportunity’, this paradigm shift attempts ‘to bring the whole to life’ through ‘growth ecology’.
The aim of the chapter is to propose a viable strategy to increase ecological resilience in margi... more The aim of the chapter is to propose a viable strategy to increase ecological resilience in marginalized communities of Ecuador (Duran municipality) and Peru (Tacna department), which are particularly prone to climate hazards. Frequently affected by floods and landslides, these events have widespread implications for the economic, social, and psychological welfare of vulnerable communities. Responding effectively and timely to these risks requires the strategic combination of social and technological systems with each ecosystem, thereby creatively linking the expertise, efforts, and investments of diverse stakeholders, including local government, scientists, industry experts, and the communities themselves. To achieve this, we propose an integrated method of interconnectivity between the sectors and disciplines to manage urban planning. The method is underpinned on getting the active engagement of communities and empowering them to better design Disaster Management and Risk Reduction (DRR) protocols. Through June to July 2019, we tested the framework during two workshops in Guayaquil, Ecuador, and Tacna, Peru, aimed to equip communities with appropriate tools to survive climate hazards. The chapter reports on the initial outcomes of the two workshops. The findings suggest ways to address complex social environmental and economic issues that have a wider impact on affected communities, going significantly beyond the municipalities reported here.
Climate Change and species extinction are perhaps two symptoms of a psychotic society that has lo... more Climate Change and species extinction are perhaps two symptoms of a psychotic society that has lost contact with reality. The pandemic pathology of economic and industrial values have possibly altered the very course of planetary evolution. As humankind starts to recognize that apocalyptic change is imminent, the practice of art(s) may be an essential discipline to emerge beyond collapse. This paper considers art in an ecological context to help us 'see anew' the potential for adopting complex ways of thinking, and 'transdisciplinary' ways of working. Challenging existing belief systems and normative ways of thinking through 'question-based learning', we may consider drawing as a means of gaining insights and practical approaches to diverse futures. 'Turning the face of disaster to the face of opportunity', this paradigm shift attempts 'to bring the whole to life' through 'growth ecology'.
First, to reflect upon the title, 'Music and Arts in Action'. We might, for certain purposes, con... more First, to reflect upon the title, 'Music and Arts in Action'. We might, for certain purposes, consider a coming together of art forms and disciplines. Not the crossovers, mergers and interdisciplinary dialectical fusions we are familiar with, but a convergence or, as the biochemist E. O. Wilson (1999) termed it, a 'consilience', a leaping together of different knowledge. Perhaps this is akin to the Nobel physicist David Bohm's 'Dialogue-A proposal' (Bohm, et al, 1991), in which processes, forms and structures synthesise as a creative act? And so we move from the co-joining action of the word 'and' to the dynamic agency of 'in'. Here we may find meaning in '…in Action', the act, or intervention that provokes and evokes a new culture, or a new society, perhaps as the artist Joseph Beuys (1990) aimed for in his concept of 'Social Sculpture'. Furthermore, that notion of dynamism embedded in 'in Action' introduces the ideas of movement, change and transformation-from one place to another, from one time to another, or from one state of being to another. 'Far from equilibrium' (Prigogne and Stengers, 1984), this relational interdependence may be understood as that embodied by whole systems ecology, or the process, pattern and structure of Music and Arts.
First, to reflect upon the title, ‘Music and Arts in Action’. We might, for certain purposes, con... more First, to reflect upon the title, ‘Music and Arts in Action’. We might, for certain purposes, consider a coming together of art forms and disciplines. Not the crossovers, mergers and interdisciplinary dialectical fusions we are familiar with, but a convergence or, as the biochemist E. O. Wilson (1999) termed it, a ‘consilience’, a leaping together of different knowledge. Perhaps this is akin to the Nobel physicist David Bohm’s ‘Dialogue – A proposal’ (Bohm, et al, 1991), in which processes, forms and structures synthesise as a creative act? And so we move from the co-joining action of the word ‘and’ to the dynamic agency of ‘in’. Here we may find meaning in ‘…in Action’, the act, or intervention that provokes and evokes a new culture, or a new society, perhaps as the artist Joseph Beuys (1990) aimed for in his concept of ‘Social Sculpture’. Furthermore, that notion of dynamism embedded in ‘in Action’ introduces the ideas of movement, change and transformation – from one place to ano...
The Kyoto Proposal: eco-art and a form of conflict
This paper combines three presentations made between January and March 2003. The first was writte... more This paper combines three presentations made between January and March 2003. The first was written for the Private View of River Life 3000: a dialogue for the beginning of time, at Shrewsbury Museum and Art Gallery. Delivered on 31 January, the eve of the Chinese New Year, this was a thank you address to fellow collaborators on making an installation, an exhibition and a community of enquiry. The second, Reflections on water: diverse definitions of art and ecology, was presented at the 3rd World Water Forum Stakeholder Centre, on 21 March as the US/UK Coalition embarked on war with Iraq. The third presentation, In the flow of time: a case study of ecological arts practice as research, was made the following day at the Honen-in Buddhist Temple, to an international arts audience.
Potentially, representing two different cultures and systems of belief, Data Science and Eco Acti... more Potentially, representing two different cultures and systems of belief, Data Science and Eco Action may at first seem to be opposing forms of knowledge and practice. However, given the realities of Climate Change and other world crises, we may find that such opposites need to be resolved to address indeterminate futures. Such resolution may give way to emergent forms of knowledge and intrinsic values. But first, we must consider what is ‘Data Science’ and ‘Eco Action’?
Unconventional Educational Approaches: An Eco-pedagogy to Address Our Transformative Challenges
Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals
Species Nova [To See Anew]: Art as Ecology
Ethics & the Environment, 2003
... David Haley. ... writing, "All true sciences are the result of experience which has pass... more ... David Haley. ... writing, "All true sciences are the result of experience which has passed through our senses, thus silencing the tongues of litigants," and "those who take for their standard any one but naturethe mistress of all mastersweary themselves in vain" (in Holt 1957, 276 ...
This paper argues that heritage is what contemporary culture makes of history and that this may d... more This paper argues that heritage is what contemporary culture makes of history and that this may distort our ability to face future realities. Funded by the UK Heritage Lottery Fund, the VIEWPOINT ecological arts project at the confluence of two rivers in Cockermouth, Northwest England, questioned the deployment of art and heritage as a means of community recovery from the 2009 and 2015 flood disasters. As the climate crisis accelerates and the psychosocial emergency increases, this project reassigned a Wordsworth poem and repurposed twelve large rocks to celebrate the potential for communities to live with their rivers in the future and defy their tendency towards nostalgia and memorialization.However, the situation was exacerbated when the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation World Heritage awarded cultural heritage status on The Lake District National Park, affixing the environmental management of the area to Beatrix Potter’s romanticized notion of shee...
First, to reflect upon the title, 'Music and Arts in Action'. We might, for certain purposes, con... more First, to reflect upon the title, 'Music and Arts in Action'. We might, for certain purposes, consider a coming together of art forms and disciplines. Not the crossovers, mergers and interdisciplinary dialectical fusions we are familiar with, but a convergence or, as the biochemist E. O. Wilson (1999) termed it, a 'consilience', a leaping together of different knowledge. Perhaps this is akin to the Nobel physicist David Bohm's 'Dialogue-A proposal' (Bohm, et al, 1991), in which processes, forms and structures synthesise as a creative act? And so we move from the co-joining action of the word 'and' to the dynamic agency of 'in'. Here we may find meaning in '…in Action', the act, or intervention that provokes and evokes a new culture, or a new society, perhaps as the artist Joseph Beuys (1990) aimed for in his concept of 'Social Sculpture'. Furthermore, that notion of dynamism embedded in 'in Action' introduces the ideas of movement, change and transformation-from one place to another, from one time to another, or from one state of being to another. 'Far from equilibrium' (Prigogne and Stengers, 1984), this relational interdependence may be understood as that embodied by whole systems ecology, or the process, pattern and structure of Music and Arts.
The Kyoto Proposal: eco-art and a form of conflict
On the W Terfront, 2003
River life: a meandering intervention
On the W Terfront, 2002
... River life: a meandering intervention David Haley SEPRU. MMU ... And it can at times be a sim... more ... River life: a meandering intervention David Haley SEPRU. MMU ... And it can at times be a simple matter of recognising the difference between a complex and complicated situation. Noah said to God, “God, what's an Ark?” And God said to Noah “How long can you tread water?” ...
This is no ordinary manifesto. For a start, its provenance might raise an eyebrow or two. Why wou... more This is no ordinary manifesto. For a start, its provenance might raise an eyebrow or two. Why would a long-established leading professional standards body such as CIWEM, with a royal charter to boot, launch a cry from the rooftops in this way?
... River life: a meandering intervention David Haley SEPRU. MMU ... And it can at times be a sim... more ... River life: a meandering intervention David Haley SEPRU. MMU ... And it can at times be a simple matter of recognising the difference between a complex and complicated situation. Noah said to God, “God, what's an Ark?” And God said to Noah “How long can you tread water?” ...
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