Consumerism and an Environmental Space
Rose Munizza
Introduction
The way in which people choose to fill up physical space is deeply interconnected with art and visual culture. This also cannot be separated from the impact that physical connection of belongings has on the world, especially in connection to climate change. To combine these two things, the consumption of art and physical belongings to fill space with the impact of physical object collection on the climate, one has to evaluate their consumerist habits. Authors such as Rose B. Simpson and Jeremy Rifkin, detail the extreme impact that over consumption is having, as well as detail how capitalist structures encourage this overconsumption. Overall, the way a person goes about consuming art, especially through decoration, has a lasting impact on the earth and I argue that through ethical art practices and the use of incorporating plant life into decoration, this can be mitigated on an individual level and consumerist natures can begin to be addressed.
A lot of eco and climate change art can appear to only be taking place on large scales. It can seem like a foreign or exclusive scene, that can be hard to integrate into everyday life. For a regular person going about everyday life, the extremes of environmental art can make participate seem impossible. One example of this is the melting ice exhibition titled Ice Watch (fig. 1), by Olafur Eliasson. This artwork, similarly, to a lot of art that centers climate change, is large on scale, required interaction of the viewer, and frames climate change in a monumental way. I wanted to take a different direction, and frame arts relation to climate change as something that can be implemented in any persons home.
Figure 1. Olafur Eliasson, Ice Watch, 2014, Place du Panthéon, Paris, 2015
Reading Inspiration
A large part of my inspiration to frame climate changes relationship to art in the home came from the reading “With Applied Creativity, We Can Heal” by Rose B. Simpson and Jessica L. Horton. In this reading, Simpson states, “If pots or other created things were made to last forever – not to die – the world would get filled up.”[1] This line was what truly spurred me in the direction of consumerism. The idea that the consumerist nature of capitalist society is leading to a world filled of belongings stood out to me, especially in the way that this cannot be separated from the consumption of art products and pieces. This combined with the examples of climate art in class that were on such a large scale, inspired me to focus more on the home and individual practiced. Integrating art, with individual climate conscious consumerist practices.
The inspiration I got from the Ros B. Simpson reading was later enforced by the reading “The Zero Marginal Cost Society” by Jeremy Rifkin. Rifkin addresses the consumerist natured that are being affected by shifts in the capitalist economy, especially with a rapid consumerist culture which supports the idea that, “the creation of one product immediately opens a vent of other products.”[2] This further supported my plans to inspect consumerist nature. From this support I chose to create a poster, which used art works that center nature, as to convey the idea that people can decorate their homes in a way that strays away from consumerist trends, and more towards an artistic and ecological lasting environment.
Part of my inspiration for this project came from the book On the Necessity of Gardening, which helped me realize that implementing plants and gardening could be a solution for avoiding over consumption of decor. This book also helped me to contextualize gardening and plants as art. In the book, the author states, “[The garden] is an essential metaphor for our relationship with the natural world.” [3] I found this to show how nature can be used in an interpretive manner similarly to art. On this basis, I start to center my project on the concept of being the outdoors, such as gardening, inside as a form of decoration and art, to work against consumerist decoration trends and make the home more environmental. This eventually cultivated in a collage poster.
Visual Inspiration
For this poster I started with and was inspired by an image of the Eden Edition Garden (fig. 2) and the digital rendering Pollinator Pathmaker (fig. 3) by Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg. Both of these pieces center the idea of local plants benefiting the local ecosystem, under the overall concept of art for pollinators. These were found in the book Garden Future, Designing Nature. In this book, the authors write about the specific project of Pollinator Pathmaker as a way to transform gardens and how they are perceive, making them into an art that simultaneously benefits the local biodiversity.[4] Pollinator Pathmaker is a digital print of local plant life, which is used to support bee populations and is argued to support local ecosystems. This is a visual od the Eden Edition Garden, which was created with the same purpose of supporting the local ecosystem. This basis is why I chose these to be the background for my poster, and my concept centers around the idea of using nature within the home, similarly to a garden, to support the local biodiversity.
Figure 2. Pollinator Pathmaker, Eden Edition Garden in Bodelva, Cornwall, 2022, photograph
Figure 3. Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg, Pollinator Pathmaker, 2022, digital rendering
On top of the base of my poster I used the image Spatial Luxury (fig. 4) by Philippe Ruault. This image was sourced from the book Dig It! Building Bound to the Ground, which was filled with architectural examples of how building, and creating space can be integrated with nature, and the outside world, emphasizing the environmental nature that the art of spaces can have.[5] This image shows a curated room, which the main source of décor is not actually coming from something placed within the home, but rather the window which focuses on the plant life outdoors. I felt that this continued to visually display my concept of using nature as a sustainable way to decorate and as an art within itself, so avoid falling into consumerist trends.
Figure 4. Philippe Ruault, Spatial Luxury, 2019, photograph
A final piece of art that inspired me and I used in my project is the photograph Ville de Nancy: Accueil a photograph by Pierre Olivier Deschamps (fig. 5). I thought that this photo shows the functionality of bringing nature into the home. The photo is of an indoor winter garden that has been integrated with living spaces in an environmental building. This matched my concept of encouraging people to use plants in their home, as well as supporting the functional, anti-consumerits ideas of this form of decoration.
Figure 5. Pierre Olivier Deschamps, Ville de Nancy: Accueil, 2006, photograph
Feedback
Something that I got a lot of feedback on from my presentation, is the ability to integrate nature into the home in other forms, such as furniture and terrariums. A few different comments specifically mentioned the use of fungi to make furniture as this relates both to my theme of home decor and using plant life as art within this. It was also mentioned that using terrarium within the home could create a mess free and sustainable source of greenery in the home. This art of creating terrariums is something that is referenced in the book Art and Climate change where the artist Libby Harward created terrariums to specifically shed light on indigenous plant life (fig. 6).[6] I think that this is an excellent point and would have worked seamlessly with my overall concept. I also agree that this could have helped add an accessibility aspect to my project. The fact that terrariums are self-sustaining and alive, also works to support the aspect of my project relating to local plant life. Integrating live plants in this form, to support biodiversity, is impressive and could be critical is supporting local ecosystems through decoration.
Figure 6. Libby Harward, Ngali ngariba, 2019
Conclusion and Final
Overall, I created a poster that focused on integrating plant life in the home and seeing plant life as art (fig. 7), in order to take individual action against over consumption. Inspired my analysis of out capitalist society, I had the goal of encouraging ethical integration of art into the home. I hope that people can reevaluate how they fill their home, to avoid following trends and falling into consumerist traps. The final product of this, will be integrated with other art pieces on a website that focus on consumerism under the umbrella of climate change and art.
Figure 7. Rose Munizza, Consumerism and an Environmental Space, 2023, digital collage
Citations
Demos, T. J., Emily Eliza Scott, and Subhankar Banerjee. “‘With Applied Creativity, We Can Heal.’” The Routledge Companion to Contemporary Art, Visual Culture, and Climate Change, 2021, 311–21. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429321108-34.
Forde, Gerard, Michele Hutchison, Laurie Cluitmans, and Maria Barnas. On the necessity of gardening: An ABC of Art, botany and cultivation. Amsterdam: Valiz, 2021.
Fowkes, Maja, and Reuben Fowkes. “Plants on the Move.” Essay. In Art and Climate Change, 50–52. London: Thames and Hudson, 2022.
Mastenbroek, Bjarne, Esther Mecredy, and Iwan Baan. Dig it! building bound to the ground. Köln: Taschen, 2021.
Rifkin, Jeremy. The Zero marginal cost society: The internet of things, the Collaborative Commons, and the eclipse of Capitalism. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015.
Stappmanns, Vivianne, Nina Steinmüller, and Carolina Maddè. “A Garden of Ideas.” Essay. In Garden Futures: Designing with Nature, 194–217. S.l.: Vitra design museum, 2023.
Image List
Figure 1. Olafur Eliasson, Ice Watch, 2014, Place du Panthéon, Paris, 2015
Figure 2. Pollinator Pathmaker, Eden Edition Garden in Bodelva, Cornwall, 2022, photograph
Figure 3. Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg, Pollinator Pathmaker, 2022, digital rendering
Figure 4. Philippe Ruault, Spatial Luxury, 2019, photograph
Figure 5. Pierre Olivier Deschamps, Ville de Nancy: Accueil, 2006, photograph
Figure 6. Libby Harward, Ngali ngariba, 2019
Figure 7. Rose Munizza, Consumerism and an Environmental Space, 2023, digital collag
1. T. J. Demos, Emily Eliza Scott, and Subhankar Banerjee, “‘With Applied Creativity, We Can Heal,’” The Routledge Companion to Contemporary Art, Visual Culture, and Climate Change, 2021, 311–21, https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429321108-34, 318. ↑
1. Jeremy Rifkin, The Zero Marginal Cost Society: The Internet of Things, the Collaborative Commons, and the Eclipse of Capitalism (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015), 8. ↑
1. Gerard Forde et al., On the Necessity of Gardening: An ABC of Art, Botany and Cultivation (Amsterdam: Valiz, 2021), 13. ↑
1. Vivianne Stappmanns, Nina Steinmüller, and Carolina Maddè, “A Garden of Ideas,” essay, in Garden Futures: Designing with Nature (S.l.: Vitra design museum, 2023), 194–217, 198. ↑
1. Bjarne Mastenbroek, Esther Mecredy, and Iwan Baan, Dig It! Building Bound to the Ground (Köln: Taschen, 2021). ↑
1. Maja Fowkes and Reuben Fowkes, “Plants on the Move,” essay, in Art and Climate Change (London: Thames and Hudson, 2022), 50–52, 50. ↑