Abstract
This paper argues for a deeper investigation into the concept of custodianship, claiming there is a dearth of empirical research on relations between political imagination, infrastructure, and custodianship in contemporary artistic research. Dutch art institutions refer to custodianship for their governance structures, and Italian grassroots art initiatives protect biodiversity and community economies. Ecuadorian artists implement discursive platforms bringing together indigenous rights activists, student movements, and artists. In all these cases, artists often politically reimagine social organisation as communal infrastructures and practices of care for the environment. In this uncharted area of research intersecting environmental humanities, civil laws studies, political theory, and contemporary art theory, Art as a Practice of Custodianship explores when art practices become practices of custodianship and how art practices contribute to climate justice struggles.I will present scholarly research on custodianship as a means of indigenous constitutional rights for environmental protection in environmental humanities and civil law studies and empirical research in the Netherlands, Italy, Ecuador and elsewhere. The study shows how the developing new theoretical work around custodianship as a practice of care and collective ownership in contemporary art contributes to the fields of art theory, political theory, environmental humanities, and civil law studies, arguing for a deeper understanding of custodianship and its potential to overcome binary forms of understanding nature and culture.
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
The Arts in Social, Political, and Community Life
KEYWORDS
ART ACTIVISM INFRASTRUCTURES CARE CLIMATE JUSTICE
