Nineteenth International Conference on the Arts in Society

Abstract

Artists and designers have had to reckon with the climate crisis, just like other disciplines. In art and design practices, sustainable materials and methods of production have historically been relegated to the sidelines, often seen as non-consequential, placing form and function over health and sustainability. In a series of courses taught over a period of five years, biomaterials such as mycelium and wheatgrass were used as a material to engage students in ecological design. Students were introduced to designing for impermanence, sometimes using waste materials, in order to develop an understanding for material recovery as well as to engage in the discourse on responsible production in art and design methodologies. By utilizing plants and living organisms as part of their production, students learn to grow and keep plants alive, developing knowledge in the creation of a built ecology. They learn through active participation that authorship is shared between them and the living material, that these materials have agency and as an artist, some degree of control has to be relinquished to the biomaterials.