The Art of Extraction
When initially developing this project, I knew I wanted to focus on extraction, however, the specifics of my thesis were not fully fleshed out. When I thought of extraction, my mind immediately jumped to mining for fossil fuels, like oil, coal, or gas. Before this project began, if you’d asked me to explain what extraction was, those were the only examples I’d give. However, while researching this topic, I discovered my pre-existing notion of extraction was limited.
Extraction refers to withdrawal of any material from nature for human consumption. This expands far beyond fossil fuels, but also includes deforestation, hunting, farming, fishing, and mining for minerals and metals.
I realized I was not alone in my previous
misunderstanding of extraction. While there is no
shortage of artists that cover topics like deforestation
and farming, I struggled to find sources that connected
these ideas to extraction. When compiling all the
examples I wanted to use as the foundation for my
project, I realized that all of them specifically referenced some kind of fossil fuel, in most cases, oil. Even our course book, Art and Climate Change by Maja andReuben Fowkes, which had a chapter dedicated to extraction, defined it only as,
“...extraction entails the removal of mineral matter from the Earth’s crust by drilling, pumping, quarrying and mining in order to render it as raw materials that can be traded as commodities and processed in industrial operations.”
Which limits extraction to purely mining. Because of this, the trajectory of my project changed to how I believe that the artistic community should broaden its definition of extraction to combat the misunderstanding of the topic.
Inspirations
The base of my square I specifically was inspired by artist Jelili Atiku titled, Let Me Clutch Thee, [4] highlighted in the book The Routledge Companion to Contemporary Art, Visual Culture, and Climate Change, which was a performance where oil was dumped on a person in a wedding dress, walking down an aisle. This performance showed the bride slipping and falling on the ground, which represented humans crippling dependency and demise on the industry. The artist describes this as a “colonial marriage” and explained that due to the
crude oil exposure, the “bride” would have to seek medical treatment, as their performance was highly toxic, and crude oil should never touch your skin. This factor highlighted the danger the industry posed on workers, since many of these extraction sites are located in areas that have limited access to health and safety measures.
Interestingly enough, I struggled to find data that expressed the number of deaths due to oil mining in non-western countries, which provides more evidence that the lives of these workers aren’t viewed as valuable enough to keep track of. This emphasized the message of danger Atiku conveyed in the piece, as the artist risked the life of the bride to represent the horrors of the industry.
When watching a recording of this performance, another specific element that stood out was the contrast of the oil against the lace and gauze of the dress. During the performance the bride removes the dress, revealing how it has been thoroughly stained, and soaked through to their skin. The visual effect of this contrast was one I wanted to expand on in my own artwork. I used scraps of lace fabric, and lace ribbon to convey the same imagery that Atiku used in their piece.
The act of pouring oil to make a statement on the fossil fuel industry was a common theme I noticed amongst anti-extraction art. It was also one that resonated with me personally. The impact of seeing the physical oil taint or destroy an object or the art itself helped bridge the disconnect I felt between myself and fossil fuel.
One of the issues our society has is the “out of sight, out of mind” mentality. The amount of fossil fuels we consume is not a tangible amount we can easily see. You cannot see the physical amount of fuel that you pump from a gas station into your car,
or the pipes that run gas through our homes.
Instead we assign this a numerical value like gallon or dollar, which further distances ourselves from the magnitude of what we consume.
This is a concept Eva Horn highlights in her paper, Aesthetics of the Anthropocene, from the book 1.5 Degrees, which acted as a guiding theme for our project. Horn examines the issue of representation, that artists, to accurately represent the aesthetic of the anthropocene, must be able to reconnect the viewer to what isn’t tangible. In her text, Horn uses carbon emissions as an example. It's a substance we are able to quantify using the unit, parts per million, but that label doesn’t capture the true impact of that value. Thus, Horn argues that it’s art's job to find a way to do that.
The importance of this is also illustrated by artists Olafur Eliasson and Minik Rosing and their display, Ice Watch [10]. Eliasson and Rosling harvested large blocks of ice from Greenland, and displayed them in a clock-like formation in front of prominent locations in Europe. This display acted as a tangible way for viewers to interact with the melting ice, watching it shrink and turn into water before their very eyes and under their fingers. Again, there are quantifying variables that express this, such as the rate a glacier melts, the shrinkage percentage per year, or the number of inches the ocean is rising, but the visual impact of the piece allowed the viewer to reconnect with the issue in a physical and impactful way.
All of these artists inspired the use of dipping my quilt square, however I expanded on their techniques, and instead of just using oil, since extraction is more than that, I used water and soap as accessible dipping mediums as well. However, to make the dipping of water and soap visible, I needed to dye all of these liquids. I chose black in particular because it’s a color that absorbs all wavelengths of light, thus it encompasses everything. I felt like this would be a good way to represent the reality of extraction, because everything we do, have, and make are all products of it.
Another text, Pollution is Colonialism, by Max Liboiron, which focuses on highlighting anticolonial perspective, specifically focusing on an indigenous lens, also inspired my dying process. In this book Liboiron poses the question “What is a chemical?” From there he describes how a group of indigenous scholars answered this question. What was specifically noted from the conversation was how no one used the western scientific compound, structural, or molecular names for the materials discussed. This was intentional because the purpose of the conversation was to represent how pollution and pollutants are better understood not by their buzzword names, like carbon dioxide, but by their place and role in society. Stripping down these chemicals to purely their place and effect helps shape a conversation around the problems with how these chemicals are used, and shifts us away from focusing on what is wrong with the chemicals themselves. The author cited how this kind of mindset is called Land Relations, which comes from an indigenous perspective that the organic world around us is made up of things that are neither good nor bad, they just are. It’s how these things are used, manipulated, or the circumstances they are in effect a judging outcome. I found this idea inspiring, specifically the reference of carbon dioxide. Carbon dioxide has become something that’s been demonized and viewed as a core cause impacting climate change, and while this all may be true, carbon dioxide is an important and powerful part of our environment. Without it, humans and nonhuman organisms wouldn’t be able to breathe, plants wouldn’t be able to photosynthesize, and our soil wouldn’t be able to hold onto water or nutrients. I wanted to incorporate this lack of labeling into my project by not specifically defining what the black liquid I’m using to dip dye my fabric in represents. Instead of focusing and pointing blame at what might be “oil”, I want to instead have my project focus on the act of extraction, not what is extracted.
Another text that influenced my mindset was, Extraction: Art on the Edge of the Abyss. In this text they explore and explain the idea of concavity. That nature is always in balance, and for us to build anything up, we must dig down equally and inversely. An example of this from the book was to create skyscrapers, we must also create mines. This stood out to me because, again, when talking about extraction immediately there is a jump to the topic of mining. Another example the authors could have given is that to build skyscrapers up we must also cut down trees, which would have referenced deforestation and still fit the analogy. While I found the overall concept discussed interesting, and that this interpretation of concavity resonating, this served to me as another example as to how people who want to explore and educate themselves on extraction, are limited to only mining.
Additionally Jermey Rifkin discusses in his book, The Age of Resilience, that there is a need to shift from the industrial revolution’s dependency on fossil fuel extraction, to the Age of Resilience and biosphere politics, which encourage the use of renewable sources of energy such as solar and wind. I realized by the true definition of extraction, renewable energy is still extractive. It’s a form of harvesting and withdrawing something from nature, and using it for human consumption. This reminded me of Land Relations, which forced me to reevaluate my bias, and deeply challenge my emotional response to the word. Extraction is not inherently good nor bad, it is necessary for human survival. Without extraction we wouldn’t be able to hunt or grow food, build homes, or create technology. It’s how, what, and the quantity we extract that determines whether or not it is good or bad. The net value of extraction is the sum of its circumstance, and this is evident through indigenous cultures and practices that have allowed people to live sustainably, and in balance for generations.
Extraction connects to other topics highlighted by our group’s quilt in a variety of ways. Many of the topics like; fishing, presented by Therema Fenandez; and farming, presented by Althea Ericksen, are direct acts of extractivism, while topics like; textile waste, presented by Aran Dorsey; and capitalism and architecture, presented by David Guillen, express how systems of extraction impact these separate issues. This goes to show how extraction is interlinked and interconnected with the vast system that allows climate change to occur. It is more than oil, it is every act we make in an effort to take and exploit the gifts of nature. Shedding light on this misconception is the first step into dismantling our society's extractivist mindset, as we can’t collectively take down what we don’t know exists. Through education and revaluation, we gain the power to critically analyze how we extract more than fuel, and switching to electric does not distance us as far for extraction as we might think. Art acts as a megaphone, a way to spread this message to the public. With art, we have an infinite canvas, an infinite number of mediums through which we can communicate and educate. However, at the end of the day, extraction is something that is embedded into human nature. By the very definition, our bare means of survival are extractivist, but as we enter this age of resilience, it’s important to shift our relationship with our planet, and learn how to not only take, but give. It is through giving, through balance, and mutual respect with nature, that we are able to strip the negative connotations of extraction, and end this heinous cycle of exploitation, once and for all.
Sources:
[1] Ignacio, Acosta, “Copper Geographies”, Photography, 2010-2015
[2] Moriyama, Victor, “Amazon Deforestation”, Photography
[3] Reuben, Fowkes Maja and. “Chapter 2 Scars of Extraction.” Essay. In Art and Climate Change. THAMES HUDSON LTD, 2022.
[4] Atiku, Jelili, “Let Me Clutch Thee”, Oil Performance, 2/18/2017, Cape Town, South Africa
[5] Demos, T. J., Emily Eliza Scott, and Subhankar Banerjee. The Routledge Companion to Contemporary Art, Visual Vulture, and Climate Change. London: Routledge, 2023.
[6] Attia, Kadar, “Oil and Sugar #2”, Oil and Sugar Film, 2007, Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA
[7] Heitzer, Anja, Johan Holten, and Sebastian Schneider. “Aesthetic of the Anthropocene by Eva Horn.” Essay. In 1.5 Degrees: Interdependencies between Life, the Cosmos, and Technology. Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz, 2023.
[8] Liberate Tate, “Human Cost”, Oil and Body, 4/20/2011, Tate Modern Art Gallery, London, England
[9] Liberate Tate, “License to Spill”, Oil Spilling Event, 6/28/2012, Tate Modern Art Gallery, London, England
[10] Eliasson, Olafur and Rosling, Minik, “Ice Watch”, Ice Display, 10/26/2014, Copenhagen, Denmark
[11] Al Qadiri, Monira, “Deep Float”, Epoxy, Acrylic and Steel, 2017, The Hague, Netherlands
[12] Liboiron, Max, Pollution is colonialism, Durham, N.C: Duke University Press, 2021.
[13] Bycroft, Madison, “Making Kin”, Multimedia installation, 2020, Kunsthaus Hamburg, Germany
[14] Kallat, Reena, “Siamese Trees”, Electric wires, Metal, and Circuit boards, 2018-2019
[15] Koch, Peter Rutledge, Samuel Pelts, Dina Pollack, Jonathan Gerken, and Edwin C. Dobb. Extraction: Art on the edge of the abyss. Berkeley, CA: The CODEX Foundation, 2020.
[16] Litvintseva, Sasha and Mann, Daniel, “Salarium”, Film, 2020
[17] Rifkin, Jeremy. The Age of Resilience: Reimagining existence on a Rewilding Earth. New York, NY: St. Martin’s Press, an imprint of St. Martin’s Publishing Group, 2022.