Environmental Aesthetics & Ethics

In recent years, ecological aesthetic education, with its focus on the human-land relationship, has gained prominence across various regions. Relationship design has emerged as a new trend in the development of ecological aesthetic education, with a profound impact on the development of children ecological aesthetic education models. From the perspectives of design stage characteristics and regional symbiosis goal, this paper reveals the function basis and development potential of relationship design in children ecological aesthetic education. Then, using the relationship design framework, three new models of children ecological aesthetic education towards regional symbiosis are summarized. With case studies, the pathways of relationship design intervention in each model are analyzed, highlighting perception, co-creation and speculation as important nodes in shaping human-land relationship.

This essay explores the relationship between biodiversity and the art of living through the lens of food, understood as both an aesthetic and environmental experience. It begins by examining the current biodiversity crisis and the proliferation of industrial food systems, which contribute to unsustainable and unhealthy lifestyles. The aesthetic dimension of eating is then analyzed in light of "aesthetic capitalism" (Böhme) and the greenwashing practices it often entails. Within the theoretical framework of Everyday Aesthetics (Berleant, Saito), the essay proposes an alternative food culture and experience grounded in the concepts of engagement and care. Drawing on the Greek notion of diaita-understood not simply as a dietary regimen but as a harmonious and mindful way of life-the essay reinterprets gastronomic experience as an embodied and situated aesthetic practice, capable of integrating sensoriality, ethics, and sustainability. In this sense, nourishment is no longer reduced to a consumable object but is redefined as a form of aisthesis: a mode of sensitive knowledge that respects and fosters both natural and cultural biodiversity.

The volume Aesthetics of Biodiversity, edited by Elisabetta Di Stefano, Valeria Maggiore, and Salvatore Tedesco, offers an interdisciplinary exploration of the relationship between aesthetics and biodiversity in the context of the current ecological crisis. Structured into four sections – theoretical roots and models, dialogue with science and ecology, artistic practices and ecological imaginaries, culture and communication – the book investigates the historical and philosophical genealogies of the aesthetic experience of biological diversity, introduces new paradigms linking aesthetics with the life sciences, and highlights the role of the arts, design, and everyday practices in fostering a more attentive and responsible relationship with the living world.
Far from considering biodiversity as a mere naturalistic datum, the contributions collected here show how it constitutes a sensitive and relational field of experience, capable of reshaping the perception, imagination, and language through which we inhabit the world. The volume thus positions itself as an operational manifesto for an ecological aesthetics of biodiversity, acknowledging biological diversity not only as a scientific and ecological value, but also as an aesthetic, political, and cultural condition of our being-in-the-world.

ITALIAN: Il volume Estetica della biodiversità, curato da Elisabetta Di Stefano, Valeria Maggiore e Salvatore Tedesco, esplora in prospettiva interdisciplinare il rapporto tra estetica e biodiversità, affrontando le sfide poste dall’attuale crisi ecologica. Articolato in quattro sezioni – radici e modelli teorici, dialogo con le scienze e l’ecologia, pratiche artistiche e immaginari ecologici, cultura e comunicazione – il volume indaga le genealogie storiche e filosofiche dell’esperienza estetica della diversità biologica, apre a nuovi paradigmi di riflessione tra estetica e scienze della vita, e mette in luce il ruolo delle arti, del design e delle pratiche quotidiane nella costruzione di un rapporto più consapevole e responsabile con il vivente.
Lungi dal concepire la biodiversità come semplice dato naturalistico, i contributi raccolti mostrano come essa costituisca un campo di esperienza sensibile e relazionale, capace di trasformare la percezione, l’immaginazione e il linguaggio con cui abitiamo il mondo. Il volume si propone così come un manifesto operativo per un’estetica ecologica della biodiversità, che riconosce nella biological diversity non solo un valore scientifico ed ecologico, ma anche una condizione estetica, politica e culturale del nostro essere al mondo

The New European Bauhaus makes Aesthetics, along with Sustainability and Inclusion, one of the three values on which to base the society of the future; a role that is also reiterated in Ar-ticulation 3 of the PNRR dedicated to the Great Field of Research and Innovation “Humanistic culture, creativity, social transformation, socie-ty of inclusion” and in the UN 2030 Agenda. Building on the awareness that the environ-mental crisis indicates a rupture in our percep-tual/emotional relationship with Nature, this paper aims to show the central role of Aesthet-ics in promoting green culture in our society. We will highlight the potential of Aesthetics to inspire and motivate, as it can help address ecological issues related to the current envi-ronmental crisis. Secondly, we will explore how Aesthetics may contribute to affirming not the superiority of human beings over Nature but their being an integral part of it. In this edito-rial contribution, we will try to answer these questions, exploring not only the contribution that contemporary Environmental Aesthetics can make at the academic/theoretical level but also the vital role it can play at the community level, or, in other words, what is the concrete impact it can have, particularly at the high school level.

Ecological philosophy will grow more important over time. Its future depends on its ability to tackle key questions like wholeness versus reduction and progress versus preservation, as well as its role in fostering ecological and social sustainability (Gare, 2018). Current trends include expanding the Anglo-American philosophical canon through pluralism, increasing engagement with continental philosophy to understand wholeness and progress, and a growing willingness to include indigenous philosophies and traditions in the search for a sustainable future. Exploring these issues and contributing to their development requires thoughtful consideration of the future of ecological philosophy as a distinct field of study (Vladykova, 2011). Ecological philosophy encompasses a range of disciplines, including ecology, ecological ethics, ecological reflection, sustainability, social movements, the Holocene, climate change, the Anthropocene, extinction, long-term survival, and technological development. An outline of priorities for future ecological philosophy research is provided. Ecological philosophy is destined to be a central concern of the twenty-first century. Modern conditions, which are both urgent and daunting, have made the field more challenging and more hopeful than ever before. The destruction caused by humanity to the planet is so extensive and severe that any meaningful effort to halt ecological decline can only be considered a Pyrrhic victory. Many engaged with ecological philosophy now find it challenging to view ecological foresight in a perspective shorter than human history or even from the beginning of the universe itself. Conversely, the current crises facing humanity also present a broad and systematic problem that philosophers have always relished, especially since its solutions can inspire the development of comprehensive new worldviews. The main priorities of ecological philosophy in the twenty-first century are thus derived from a small set of interconnected challenges and promises. However, when balancing these priorities, it’s essential to recognize that different emphases can lead to very different, often divergent, future paths (Gare, 2018; Vladykova, 2011).

Gustav Theodore Fechner was the founder of psychophysics and experimental aesthetics. He extended the realm of psychophysics to the aesthetic and artistic phenomena he was interested in, conducting empirical investigations on the golden section and the authenticity of artworks. Fechner distinguished between philosophical aesthetics and empirical aesthetics, emphasizing the empirical foundation necessary for establishing a general aesthetic system and advocating for supplementing the speculative method “from Above” with the empirical approach “from Below”. He reasoned through more than twenty aesthetic principles and laws to fortify the aesthetic experience and provided detailed expositions and defenses of individual principles, such as the principle of aesthetic association. On this basis, he proposed three methods of experimental aesthetics that can be used individually or in combination: the “method of choice”, the “method of production”, and the “method of use”. Despite the long-standing challenges and doubts from philosophical aesthetics and experimental psychology, and a period of relative disregard, Fechner’s perspective on an egalitarian and inclusive approach was prophetically ahead of his time. Experimental aesthetics, as an important historical precursor to contemporary neuro-humanities research, continues to be practiced and has increasingly shown its vitality and signs of revival by the wave of naturalized philosophy.

It has been suggested that urbanization does not create ways of life but rather offers models that satisfy the expectations of public life. These models can result from the ways that architects, designers, artists, and social actors shape the urban atmosphere setting. In this context, this paper focuses on how São Paulo has worked toward designing a smart city with elements that advance complex issues and promote climate change solutions. This paper explores the processes of aestheticizing and expanding public spaces through an empirical qualitative analysis in which the visual value of a space is evaluated based on cognitive and emotional perceptions. The analysis concludes that aesthetics goes beyond visual and symbolic meanings. By incorporating sustainable and culturally diverse solutions, cities can showcase ethical and aesthetic values that go beyond just a “green image” associated with ecology. A sustainable city that promotes these values is what defines the urban atmosphere.

How do we open our sense of being? What is to be our intrinsic nature - iyalbu from which action flows freely bound by the laws of a chosen, crafted consciousness? What is this residual loneliness of being that makes us who we are as part of the greater earth? How do we create a sense of belonging? How do we find ourselves - trillions of years old in star dust and tracing our ways back to a single ancestor of life?

Na podlagi nekaterih izhodišč, ki jih v svojih prispevkih ponudi ena od ključnih teoretskih referenc sodobnih umetnosti, ki se ukvarjajo z ekologijo, Timothy Morton, se v članku osredotočim na široko polje estetske pojavnosti narave skozi zgodovino umetniškega upodabljanja zlasti v vizualnih medijih. Pri tem poskušam pokazati, da estetske pojavnosti narave, kakor se producira preko različnih umetniških (vizualnih, avdiovizualnih, literarnih) medijev, ni mogoče zvesti na ozko razumljene podobe narave, saj je umetnost imanentno ambientalno poetična: vedno producira tudi modele odnosnosti poljubnih organizmov do okolja in modele prostora, kar je natanko področje ekologije.

A little more than thirty years ago, Allen Carlson argued that although the concept of "Camp" would seem to allow for the aesthetic redemption of roadside clutter and junkyards, it does not.[1] He opposes those who claim that if one takes the right attitude to roadside clutter it can be seen as aesthetic. In this essay I argue that that there is nothing wrong with this, although I will not base my argument on the idea of Camp sensibility.

While eco-aesthetics and ecocritical discourse have been reflected in (recent) performance studies, their relation to operational ecology and sustainable modes of production needs to be further developed terminologically and methodologically. The paper discusses the intersection of aesthetic, discursive, and operational approaches of the performative arts to ongoing environmental and climate destruction. It positions itself vis-à-vis their diverse forms of knowledge and action and proposes ways of their transformative interweaving. Rather than continuing to pit artistic and administrative interests against each other, thereby reaffirming or even deepening the Great Divide between aesthetics and operations, the paper argues for connecting these fields in theory and practice in such a way that they can respond to each other conceptually, question their respective assumptions, and experiment with transformative potentials that approximate the radicality, magnitude, and complexity of current and future environmental challenges.

The human presence is unavoidable, not only in the natural world but on the very occasion of beauty. There is little or nothing on this planet that has not been influenced by human action. Not only have people radically altered the earth's surface, but human practices have affected the atmosphere, the seas, the very climate. Moreover, the awareness of beauty and the aesthetic satisfaction this affords are grounded in perceptual experience, a human occurrence. Our recognition and participation are essential in recognizing beauty's presence and indeed for its very possibility. Nature untouched, then, is a state found exclusively in prehuman history and about which we can only conjecture. It exists now merely as a speculative idea, for a person's awareness is the filter through which both nature's meanings and its beauties are necessarily apprehended. The title of this chapter is therefore not a conflict of opposites but somewhat ironic, since nature, as we know it, and...

In this paper we track the evolution of a specific ‘ethical, aesthetic impulse’ in environmental art practice, looking for indications of value exchange between the human and non-human. The ethical-aesthetic impulse is the move by artists towards nature as a context and subject for work that addresses ethical ideas and aesthetic opportunities in relationship to a changing environment. We outline a theoretical framework that is defined by environmental aesthetics and informed by ideas about relational and dialogic aesthetics. We come to the ethical issue through pragmatism and a specific approach that is grounded in phenomenology. This framework informs the analysis of three case studies of artwork with trees and forests by Alan Sonfist, Joseph Beuys, and Helen and Newton Harrison. Our analyses address the relationship between experience, imagination and memory as a pathway to empathic experience, which we argue is an important step in the evolution ethical values. In the final secti...

I have been sketching birds for a while now wondering to myself why I seem to be captivated with them. The regal pelicans at Jakkur Lake, Bengaluru, India have stilled my mind in the last few months. For a few years now, I have been fascinated with cranes, herons, pelicans, black-headed ibis, cormorants, and the flamingos. Shelducks, pochards, painted storks, darters, egrets, pintails – the list is rather endless. There is something transformative about watching lakes, ponds, birds in their contained movements bursting into sudden flight. I am enthralled as I am curious about their beings. There are many ways in which one can choose to be curious. I for one am curious about the relationship between form and consciousness. I wonder as I watch the wingspans of painted storks and herons, why it is that they choose to embody these forms. Elegance, sensuousness, gracious beauty, lightness of being, and clearly unique temperaments to match their glorious forms, I am forever caught in the ...

The nineteenth-century invention of the category of the "spiritual"as opposed to being religious was deeply entangled within American Romanticism's larger project of reenchanting nature. While this relocation of spiritual authority out of the church and into the woods and wilderness echoes some of the larger dynamics of secularization that have long been a problematic for theories of Romanticism (see Abrams 1971), it also birthed a form of nature religiosity that still colors, for better and for worse, much contemporary American environmental thought. One of American Romanticism's most consequential legacies in the present, this chapter argues, is in an ongoing American predilection for sanctified landscape. This predilection is buttressed by models of conversion and self-transformation that have deep roots in Emersonian Transcendentalism and its larger dilations within postbellum culture. If this is where the sublimity of the New World has sometimes met the "woo-woo" of the New Age, this green spirituality and its attendant aesthetic forms has nevertheless inculcated viable forms of environmental politics, from legal frameworks for preservation and conservation to more radical forms of civil disobedience and environmental activism.

"Bird and Line" is an artistic inquiry into the relationship between a deep state of artistic consciousness and the act of drawing a line to arrive at the form of a bird. This inquiry further proposes that by using line as a mode of research, the artist begins to perceive the consciousness of a bird and the relationship it shares with its form.
For me, the embodied and porous experiences of watching and knowing birds through the practice of working with "line" as an artistic element allow for an intimacy of experiencing and an unfolding of intersubjectivity. Artistic inquiry also acts as an investigation into self-awareness and self-realization in this space of making eco-art. These acts of being lead me into reflections on how perception and creativity are melded together during creative moments to allow for a porous consciousness to emerge and perform the act of drawing a bird. As an artist working with text, movement, and image, I embed questions on the ethics of creativity into how we evolve our lines of art, as well as encounter other beings. By unraveling the relationship between the inner and the outer through Indian aesthetic philosophy, I evolve methods for eco-art practice using line as an element. I emphasize the importance of artistic research with a framework of Indian aesthetics as a way of deepening our perception and relationships with the natural world.
This article is written to make artistic processes visible through a reflective auto-ethnographic approach. I write in a non-linear reflective narrative to comprehend cultural ontologies that drive my practice, unfolding internal thought processes, directions of research, and moments of mystical experience.

Most of us have not known-or cared-where our electricity comes from. Our attitude is changing, however, as we turn toward wind energy, now the fastest-growing renewable energy resource in the world. Because we cannot extract and transport the raw energy of the wind, reaping its many environmental benefits requires that we cope with the landscape presence of its development wherever it occurs. Sometimes this interferes with the value of open space, and sometimes it may be close to subdivisions. It is the immobility and very visibility of wind power that makes its presence unavoidable. In that regard it cannot be hidden underground, stored in tanks, or moved by trains. It is an energy resource that reminds us that our electricity comes from somewhere. The more we wish to tap the power of the wind, the less we will be able to avoid the responsibilities that our demand for energy brings. This necessary bargain, first evident near Palm Springs, California, is now being experienced wherever wind power is being developed.

Che ruolo gioca la dimensione estetica nelle strategie di conservazione delle specie a rischio? Qual è il nesso tra bellezza naturale e tutela della biodiversità? Che cosa sono le Environmental Humanities e in che modo è possibile impostare un discorso interdisciplinare sulla crisi ecologica? Questi alcuni degli interrogativi al centro di un ciclo di seminari online promosso dall'Università di Firenze e in programma tra aprile e maggio 2021. Grazie a contributi di esperti nazionali e internazionali sul tema, il ciclo intende offrire approcci interdisciplinari ai temi della crisi ecologica, del climate change e della sostenibilità ambientale.
Il ciclo di seminari è parte del progetto competitivo di ateneo 2021-2022, finanziato dall'Università di Firenze, "Unveiling, assessing and taking advantage of the aesthetic dimension in conservation practices: butterflies as a case study, between new theoretical insights and practical applications", di cui sono responsabili Mariagrazia Portera (DILEF, Unifi) e Leonardo Dapporto (BIO, Unifi).
La partecipazione ai seminari è libera e gratuita. Gli interessati possono iscriversi attraverso la piattaforma EventBrite (qui: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/estetica-ecologia-biodiversita-1-ciclo-di-seminari-interdisciplinari-tickets-145240932539) oppure inviando una mail a mariagrazia.portera@unifi.it. Il link per partecipare agli incontri sarà fornito solo agli iscritti. Per informazioni sul progetto "Unveiling" e sul ciclo di seminari, è possibile contattare Mariagrazia Portera all'indirizzo mariagrazia.portera@unifi.it

PROGRAMMA DEGLI INCONTRI:
15 aprile 2021, h15-17:
• Leonardo Dapporto (Università di Firenze) e Mariagrazia Portera (Università di Firenze): Presentazione del progetto "Unveiling, assessing and taking advantage of the aesthetic dimension in conservation practices: butterflies as a case study, between new theoretical insights and practical applications", obiettivi e sviluppo
• Fabrizio Desideri (Università di Firenze): Estetica e biodiversità: un paradigma possibile
• Alessandro Minelli (Università di Padova): Oltre i numeri e le forme – i molti aspetti della biodiversità
• Franca Zanichelli (naturalista; ex Parco dell’Arcipelago toscano): La bellezza nell’osservazione naturalistica. Il punto di vista del visitatore dei parchi naturali
22 aprile 2021, h15.30-17
• Giancarlo Sturloni (SISSA, Trieste): Le parole della crisi: perché comunicare la crisi ecologica è così difficile?
29 aprile 2021, h15.30-17
• Serenella Iovino (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill): Environmental Humanities. Istanze, obiettivi, prospettive
6 maggio 2021, h15.30-17
• Daniela Fargione (Università di Torino): Un esempio di ecologia letteraria: Flight Behavior di Barbara Kingsolver
13 maggio 2021, h15.30-17
• Mauro Mandrioli (Università di Modena e Reggio Emilia): Tra natura e cultura. Sostenibilità ecologica e scelte alimentari
20 maggio 2021, h15.30-17
• Emily Brady (University of Texas, A&M): Aesthetics, ecology and climate change. A philosophical approach
27 maggio 2021, h.15.30-17
• Renato Bruni (Università di Parma): Non è verde ciò che è verde ma è verde ciò che piace. Siamo sicuri?

It is often ignored by contemporary Chinese environmental aesthetics academia that the beginning, deepening and construction of North American environmental aesthetics bear the imprint of the time. The crisis of “visual quality”, as it is pertinent to landscape study, has raised theoretical concerns. In a practical sense, environmental aesthetics attends to the visual environment and aims to transform it, which is manifested in such scholarly activities as the technical assessment, aesthetic reflections, and analysing natural and human factors in landscapes. Frankly, the methodology used by environmental aestheticians is one which regarded environment as visual scenery in a simplistic way, making an analogy between environment and painting. The environmental issues triggered not only scientific quantification but also theoretical thinking. Reconstructing its philosophical discourse, North America environmental aesthetics came on the stage in a way independent of traditional philosophy of art. Nevertheless, there still exists an intrinsic connection between the artistic discourse and the environment discourse, and the inner unity of the two never split. It is evident to see that artistic-analysis method of analytic aesthetics and John Dewey’s experience theory continued to exert influence in environmental aesthetics. The former adopted the analytic approach to artistic works and concepts in the study of environment, and the latter, accompanying the expanding conceptions of art, tried to find the inner consistency – “experience” – in the fusion of art and environment. After Kendall Walton’s “Categories of Art”, Allen Carlson put forward “Categories of Nature” to build the objective knowledge of necessity toward adequate appreciation, which is applicable to both natural science and history. Carlson research approach attached importance to the analytical pattern concerning what exactly was the object and how to appreciate it, but it neglected how the experience could be aesthetic. Arnold Berleant inherited Dewey’s idea of “one experience” and emphasized the continuity between daily life and aesthetic activity. Contrary to Carlson’s objective analysis, Berleant proposed the perception description as the main method in the representation of experiential engagement situation. That is to say, Berleant intended to explain the aesthetic experience itself, but not the elements or chances. Besides traditional aesthetics, North American environmental aesthetics also followed the traditional ecological wisdom of “organic community” and its contemporary variants. The most remarkable contribution can trace back to Henry Thoreau, Aldo Leopold, Rachel Carson, and their consistent ethical reflections between human beings and the nature. Aesthetic factors are an important emotional constituent in considering the ethical relation between human beings and nature, and it made a powerful motive for us to protect the environment. Based on this, it can be said that the environment’s aesthetic value and its ethical value are tightly connected, and such a connection could provide impetus for the future reformation of environmental aesthetics. In China, scholars have attended to the fundamental problems and the central ideas of North American environmental aesthetics, ignoring its academic relations to the twentieth-century geography, traditional aesthetics and ethics. This article aims to clarify the inner source of contemporary theory and shed some light on how we can build our environmental aesthetics that is rooted in our practical experience and thought tradition.

Als Teildisziplin der philosophischen Ästhetik ist die Naturästhetik ein Forschungsgebiet, dem philosophische Ansätze inklusive Naturauffassungen und Überlegungen zur Stellung des Menschen in der Natur zu Grunde liegen und das sich der ästhetischen Dimension der aus unterschiedlichen Kulturtraditionen resultierenden Paradigmen von Mensch und Natur widmet.

The term ‘nature’ remains an ambiguous, contentious concept which continues to prove a stumbling block in environmental theory and practice, for example, conservation. While various definitions of nature abound it is most commonly defined as that which is independent of human agency.  According to this definition human beings and their artefacts are separate from what is considered a wholly independent nature.  As a result it has created a prevalent culture/nature dualism that inhibits both practical land management and the formulation of a viable environmental ethic.  In seeking to establish a cohesive understanding on which we can collectively draw I present an understanding of nature qua identity.  The account of nature that I propose, not only, resonates with the intuitions from which the expression springs but removes the nature/culture divide.  On the account I present it is to understood nature as inclusive of human beings since it describes a collective dimension of the identity that we hold in common with all evolved entities.  To speak of nature, on this view, is not to speak of some scientific or ontological basis for it but it is to identify narrative qualities that characterise and define it.  I illustrate how this collective dimension of our identity, and the affective bonds of allegiance that it affords, makes our relationship to the non-human world significant, such that the scope and integrity of our human interaction with it can be of major concern.  In light of this  account of nature I argue that to describe environments as ‘natural’ or ‘unnatural’, is to communicate a relational distinction; a distinction that bears on the integrity of the relations set up by the interaction of human and non-human elements. In conclusion I examine the ramifications of this account of nature for considering the rationale that drives conservation.

The question I ask in this paper is whether some works of art could teach us to aesthetically appreciate nature. The first part of the text presents the current debate in analytical aesthetics on appreciation of nature, and examines Allen Carlson thesis that only natural sciences, and not art, teach us to appreciate natural beauty. Carlson argues that natural sciences as biology or ecology show us nature as it is, making possible an objective aesthetics of nature, while art only projects subjective ideas on it. The text examines the arguments raised against this thesis by different authors, some of them defending a cognitivist position and some a non-cognitivist one.

The 21st century is the time of a deepened ethical awareness of ecology. Among the topics that have been gaining more and more recognition are the ethical issues connected with restoration ecology, sustainability, the importance of insects (bees, for example) for the environment, the environmental impact of the fashion industry or of the meat and dairy industries. A notable example of a relatively new ethico-ecological topic is the ethics of space: according to some ethicists, we can no longer think that ecology is restricted to the condition of our planet alone. Apart from gaining recognition within the academic discourse, some of these topics are becoming increasingly popular on the level of everyday functioning and lifestyle choices. Such lifestyle choices may be connected with what one eats, with the way one travels during holidays or commutes on a daily basis, with buying local goods instead of those transported internationally, with reducing the amount of waste one produces (the zero-waste lifestyle), or with buying clothes that have been manufactured without causing environmental damage. In fact, we are faced with a multitude of new everyday practices motivated by the ethical concern for the environment, and these practices in themselves are worthy of research.

abstract In this paper I would like to address the problem of the aesthetic value of damaged nature. A variety of arguments have been offered in order to ground the view that we cannot perceive damaged nature as beautiful, at least as soon as we are aware of its damaged condition. These arguments are usually offered in tandem with a view about what the correct appreciation of nature involves and, hence, are often supported by this view. I will try to show that none of these arguments are compelling and that there seems to be a way of explaining how damaged nature can be beautiful without disposing of the intuition that the awareness of its damaged condition penetrates our perception.

John Stuart Mill is known as the first canonical Western philosopher to espouse a stationary state of economic growth, and as such he can be seen as an important totemic figure for reformist strategies in environmental ethics. However, his reputation among environmental thinkers has been rendered more ambiguous in recent years by increased attention to his essay "Nature". The "Nature" essay has been much used lately by critics to oppose claims (1) that independent nature may properly be seen as important in any way as an ethical guide or inspiration, and (2) that Mill's philosophy may feasibly be viewed as pro-environmentalist. This use of Mill's essay is mistaken, and has undermined appreciation of the potential significance of Mill's thought for environmental philosophy. When examining the most detailed of the critical treatments of the essay, reading "Nature" as an anti-environmentalist text badly distorts the essay's meaning by ripping it from the context of Mill's intentions as well as from the very specific and significant historical circumstances and biographical conditions of its production. Attending properly to these factors shows that the essay is unrepresentative of Mill's general position and rather philosophically weaker than its reputation. Reading the text as a definitive statement of Mill's supposed anti-naturalism is thus mistaken and fails to recognize different modes and significances in "following nature", some of which Mill supported. The "Nature" essay is an aberrant outlier in the Mill canon, and one which should no longer be allowed to undermine Mill's strong and important environmentalist credentials.

Essay published in FourbyThree Magazine

Can we access the plurality of our contemporary world through silence? And to what do the limits of our sonic imagination attest to? Artist and writer Salomé Voegelin re-listens to the body in silence, so as to grant a new agency, whereby she repositions the relationship between the self and others at the edge of the aesthetic and political.

http://www.fourbythreemagazine.com/issue/silence/accessing-the-silence-of-the-inaudible

Most of us have not known-or cared-where our electricity comes from. Our attitude is changing, however, as we turn toward wind energy, now the fastest-growing renewable energy resource in the world. Because we cannot extract and transport the raw energy of the wind, reaping its many environmental benefits requires that we cope with the landscape presence of its development wherever it occurs. Sometimes this interferes with the value of open space, and sometimes it may be close to subdivisions. It is the immobility and very visibility of wind power that makes its presence unavoidable. In that regard it cannot be hidden underground, stored in tanks, or moved by trains. It is an energy resource that reminds us that our electricity comes from somewhere. The more we wish to tap the power of the wind, the less we will be able to avoid the responsibilities that our demand for energy brings. This necessary bargain, first evident near Palm Springs, California, is now being experienced wherever wind power is being developed.

This paper applied an ecocritical perspective on street art to expand on the notion that street art can have an impact on how we relate to urban public space. In doing so, it argued that street art is particularly well positioned to affect the way we think and act with regard to the environment.

How to cite this work:
Svabo, C., & Ekelund, K. (2015). Environmental Aesthetics: Notes for design ecology. In E. Christensen (ed.), Nordes 2015: Design ecologies Stockholm: Nordic Design Research.

Free PDF access:
https://archive.nordes.org/index.php/n13/article/view/373/352
https://archive.nordes.org/index.php/n13/article/view/373

The philosophical subfield environmental aesthetics can contribute to the design of sustainable futures. Environmental aesthetics provides a conceptual framework for understanding the relationship between nature and culture. Current positions in environmental aesthetics are lined out and used as backdrop for contributing an ecological approach to design. Three green aesthetic design strategies are sketched: Coated Green, Green Core and Green Stream.

This paper explains how scientific knowledge is relevant to aesthetic appreciation of nature by drawing on Gadamer’s observation that all understanding “is to be thought of ... as participating in an event of tradition.” Allen Carlson argues that scientific knowledge enhances our aesthetic appreciation of natural environments. This is true, but not because ‘applying scientific knowledge’ is a step in a methodical approach for appreciating the beauty of nature. Rather, to experience nature aesthetically is a way to understand something about nature through understanding the tradition in which this experience occurs.  Science is a crucial part of this tradition.

This paper presents an approach to understanding green aesthetics in clothing and design-forsustainability that unifies existing theories and describes aspects of green aesthetics. The aim of this paper is to define the dimensions of aesthetic perception in design and commodities, and while doing so the focus is on green aesthetics in clothing. Hence the approach is made on the basis of aesthetic discourse yet with a multidisciplinary view. The study first constructs an understanding of clothing aesthetics in general: the definition and understanding 'thin' aesthetics in the context of clothing, which combines product properties, multilayered pleasure experiences, and creativity elements. Secondly the study lays the ground for defining green aesthetics, a 'thick' aesthetic evaluation based on environmental aesthetics. Finally the study constructs a framework by which to approach green aesthetics in clothing. On the basis of this paper, parallels and synergies between green aesthetics in design objects and the definition of design-for-sustainability can be drawn, merging aesthetic attributes with environmental values. Hence the paper opens new views on normative beauty in commodities.

Washington State has seen a boom of industrial-scale wind farm construction over the past 10 years. The siting process for these projects has prompted conflict between those most directly impacted and those who favor broader community benefits.
The intent of this research is to develop an extensive geographic visual guide, which captures the political and geographic scales of this struggle and sheds light on who participates in the siting process and what that participation means for understanding broader policy questions about energy development, rural landscapes and public participation. Information on participating stakeholders was obtained by analyzing publicly available documents and media sources. Participants’ names, physical locations, and stances on wind projects were then inputted into an online mapping platform alongside locations of approved wind turbines.
I believe that the research methods employed here will help inform future efforts in visualizing qualitative data and that the final map will highlight how inequalities manifest in large scale industrial development.

This paper is rooted in hybridity. It draws from ecophilosophy and is informed by decades of art practice and exploration of the role of art in the world. Its taproot is love of place, especially of the wild, west coast of Canada, a community of myriad species in a green and fecund home-place. In it I reflect on questions of how art practices and aesthetic engagement in particular might hold the promise of change for the better in human-world, or nature-culture, relations. The conversation opens by proposing that the current ecocrisis is symptomatic of an ontological crisis, and further, that this ecocrisis presents an opportunity for a necessary shift in worldview, or ontology, and hence to our understanding of the place of humans in the world. I argue that without such a shift we will perpetuate a dangerous alienation from a world in which we are, in every sense, environed-an alienation that has led to a continuum of unsustainable practices. Canada is, I think, a good lens through which to view questions of ontology and sustainability, and I next discuss why I think this to be so. I then introduce the idea of aesthetic engagement, and of the arts, as holding the promise of being key agents of change vis-à-vis a shift in worldview. I bring this discussion to the Canadian west coast, where artists have opened conversational spaces that, among other things, accomplish what Marshall