Learning from the Earth: Three-day International Conference at the Institute for Land and Environmental Art, organized on the occasion of the 4th International Summer School Alps Art Academy and the Environmental Biennale Art Safiental

Responding to the times of planetary crisis caused by the effects of extractive, racial and colonial capitalism, the symposium Learning from the Earth aims to bring us closer to our planet to forge modes of learning from the Earth, including these alternative—at times unlearned or forgotten—ways of listening to other earthly beings. Gathering fourteen speakers representing various perspectives, specialisms, and approaches, the symposium addresses issues of sustainability, biodiversity, the human-animal-plant hierarchy, holism, cosmology, and nature(culture). It asks, what should be learned, and unlearned, in order to create a more ecologically just future and how can artistic practice contribute to these processes? The symposium’s speakers will present contributions that are both commentaries and proposals critically examining the present and suggesting alternatives to the current planetary developments.

Learning from the Earth has been organized by, and is a part of, the research series of the Institute for Land and Environmental Art ILEA. The symposium accompanies the summer school Alps Art Academy (August 25- September 3, 2022) and the concurrent biennial Art Safiental (July 2 – October 23, 2022) which take place in Safiental, Grisons (CH). The upcoming publication Landscape 2, to be published in 2023, will feature the results of this research.