Catastrophe from a Distance. The Tragedy of Ecological Art

Abstract

The author presents selected works of ecological art aimed at preventing climate catastrophe. She argues that their fundamental problem stems from a basic characteristic of aesthetic experience: participating in artistic activities presupposes a sense of security and distance. The purpose of ecological art, however, is to sound the alarm, thereby depriving us of this sense of security. This is why ecological art is doomed to failure, which should come as no surprise. Distance is – this is the crux of the article's argument – an obvious element in theories of aesthetic experience from Burke and Kant to Bollough and Gadamer's hermeneutics. Here is the paradox of ecological art: aesthetic experience presupposes a sense of security, but alarmism takes it away. Thus, the impotence of artistic alarmism is added to the tragedy of climate change.