Upcoming in February 2012

The month of February will be quite busy:

• I will moderate a semi-plenary forum on “Connecting and Catalyzing: Aesthetics + Community + Ecology toward a culture of sustainability” at the “Radius of Art” Conference at the Heinrich Boell Foundation in Berlin, Feb. 8th-9th. (I was part of the organization of that conference, conceiving its thematic window “art towards cultures of sustainability”.) More information on the conference website
• In parallel to the conference, the Heinrich Boell Foundation will be publishing, in its “ecology” series, an essay of mine, entitled “Toward global (environ)mental change: Transformative Art and Cultures of Sustainability”. [I will give the download link when available...]
• I will speak at the symposium “Science, Sustainability, and the Arts” at the 2012 Meeting of the AAAS (American Association for the Advancement of Science), in Vancouver on Feb. 17th. More information at this webpage
• I will take part in this year’s HERA ‘Matchmaking’ event in Berlin on the 21st (a research fundraising related event)
• I will present a paper at the Leuphana Sustainability Summit “Sustainability: Enabling a Transdisciplinary Approach”, at Leuphana University Lueneburg, Feb 29th to March 2nd (conference webpage here). The paper is entitled “Aesthetics of Sustainability: a transdisciplinary approach requires a sensibility to complexity”.

2 articles recently published

The last two articles I published, are both freely available online. I want to thank the initiators of both publications who originally invited me to contribute an article, i.e. Basarab Nicolescu on the one hand, and Katja Hellkoetter on the other hand

• Sacha Kagan. “Aesthetics of Sustainability: A Transdisciplinary Sensibility for Transformative Practices”. Transdisciplinary Journal of Engineering & Science, Vol. 2, pp.70-79 (December, 2011).  Available here

• Sacha Kagan, “Art and Sustainability: The search for cultures of sustainability is not an easy journey”, in Katja Hellkoetter (Ed.), Europe China Cultural Compass: Orientation for Intercultural Cooperation between China and Europe, Beijing: Goethe Institut, 2011, pp. 258-263 (pp. 209-214 in the Chinese version). Available here

Upcoming talk at the HFBK (Hamburg) on art and sustainability

I’ll be having a talk next Tuesday at Hamburg’s Art School. More info (in German) below. My talk will be in English, though

Hamburg, 22. November 2011, 17 Uhr, BIBLIOTHEK DER HFBK 

ART AND SUSTAINABILITY – DIE KUNST DER NACHHALTIGKEIT – Ein Gespräch mit WIEBKE GRONEMEYER und DR. SACHA KAGAN

Die kulturelle Dimension von Nachhaltigkeit bedeutet eine tiefe Veränderung der herrschende Verhältnisse. Kunst muss hier eine zentrale Funktion übernehmen: doch was ist nachhaltige Kunst? Etwa eine Kunst, die nicht nur auf gesellschaftliche Probleme aufmerksam macht, sondern in Gesellschaft eingreifen, bzw. diese sogar verändern möchte? Im Gespräch mit Sacha Kagan erörtert Wiebke Gronemeyer, freie Kuratorin und Autorin in Hamburg, die Bedingungen, Verhältnisse und Strategien nachhaltiger künstlerischer Praxis.

Dr. Sacha Kagan ist Soziologe und Kulturwissenschaftler an der Leuphana Universität, Lüneburg. Sein Hauptinteresse gilt dem disziplinübergreifenden Forschungsbereich von Kunst und Nachhaltigkeit. Des weiteren arbeitet er im Bereich der Soziologie von Kunst
und Kultur und der Kulturökonomie. Kürzlich erschien „Art and Sustainability: Connecting Patterns for a Culture of Complexity“ im Bielefelder transcript Verlag. Seit 2007 koordiniert er die internationale Ebene des Künstler- und Aktivistennetzwerk Cultura21.

Wiebke Gronemeyer arbeitet als freie Kuratorin und Autorin in Hamburg und London. Ihr Interesse gilt vor allem den gesellschaftlichen Bedingungen zeitgenössischer Kunstproduktion und der Art und Weise, wie kuratorische Praxis sich zu diesen verhält. Derzeit promoviert sie über die Methoden der Wissensproduktion in kuratorischer Praxis bei Dr. Andrea Phillips und Prof. Dr. Boris Groys am Goldsmiths College, London.

Mit freundlicher Unterstützung der Karl H. Ditze Stiftung

Bengaluru

I’ll be taking part again in a “Tipping Point” meeting, this time in India. (This is the second time I am taking part in this type of event. The first time was in Potsdam, a few years ago. I was not really convinced by the format, but met some interesting people in the process.) On 11th and 12th November 2011 The “Tipping Point” organization will present “TippingPoint India” in Bengaluru. They are working in partnership with the British Council India and Khoj International Artists’ Association. I’m thankful to Pooja Sood, at KHOJ, for this invitation, and looking forward to the exchanges with Indian artists, scientists and activists.

Reader’s feedback

Ailsa Grieve sent me the following text & pictures, about reading my new book Art and Sustainability: Connecting Patterns for a Culture of Complexity (which is published at transcript Verlag): “hey sacha, just finished your book, it has been my travel companion through portugal spain and now in paris. its brilliant. really illuminating and insightful. well done, I’ve really enjoyed reading it, and like a novel, excited to pick it up again. here are some funny pics of me and the book through europe. i took it hiking so it certainly now looks like it has seen better days. anyway best of luck! my best wishes to you!”

Thanks Ailsa !