Haley, David

on the w terfront Public Art Urban Design Civic Participation Urban Regeneration

DAvid Haley

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The Kyoto Proposal: eco-art and a form of conflict

Haley, DAvid

Revistes CientÃ­fiques de la Universitat de Barcelona

Revistes Catalanes amb Accés Obert

   Waterfornts of Art III . Public Art & Urban Design: Interdisciplinary and Social Perspectives 
  
 
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The Kyoto Proposal: eco-art and a form of conflict 
 
DAVID HALEY,  
MIRIAD,  
Faculty of Art and Design, 
 Manchester Metropolitan University, d.haley@mmu.ac.uk 
 
 
 
Introduction 
 
This paper combines three presentations made between January and March 2003.  The first was 
written for the Private View of River Life 3000: a dialogue for the beginning of time, at Shrewsbury 
Museum and Art Gallery.  Delivered on 31 January, the eve of the Chinese New Year, this was a 
thank you address to fellow collaborators on making an installation, an exhibition and a 
community of enquiry.  The second, Reflections on water: diverse definitions of art and ecology, 
was presented at the 3rd World Water Forum Stakeholder Centre, on 21 March as the US/UK 
Coalition embarked on war with Iraq.  The third presentation, In the flow of time: a case study of 
ecological arts practice as research, was made the following day at the Honen-in Buddhist 
Temple, to an international arts audience. 
 
The basic elements of the presentations were art, water and ecology and the underlying theme 
was an exploration of the relationship between humankind and climate change.  This was 
illustrated by an audio visual narrative of the Shrewsbury based River Severn project.  Definitions 
of ‘eco-art’ and ‘dialogue’ established a common understanding of the content, form and process 
of eco-arts practice.  The definitions also make the argument for an eco-centric culture and 
propose that may be achieved through an understanding of aesthetic diversity.  Drawn from time, 
place and circumstance, this paper will present The Kyoto Proposal: eco-art and a  form of 
conflict. 
 
Context 
 
Once the Imperial Capital of Japan, Kyoto may still claim to be the country’s spiritual and cultural 
centre.  As well as world renowned images of temples, Zen gardens and Geisha, Kyoto has 
become closely associated with the adoption of the United Nations Framework Convention 
Climate Change and the 1997 Protocol to ratify, accept and approve it by member nations.  Kyoto 
was, therefore, an entirely appropriate setting for the 2003 3rd World Water Forum.   
 
Following the disappointing 2002 Johannesburg Earth Summit, which at least recognised the 
importance of water, Kyoto promised to reinforce global action on water security.  Among the 
most significant developments to take place between the second and third World Water Forums, 
and between Johannesburg and Kyoto was the introduction of both ‘inclusion’ and art as integral 
elements to the proceedings and to the understanding of the earth’s environmental situation.   
 
Perhaps the New York Times was correct?  In its only coverage of the 2002 Earth Summit (after 
the event) it laid the blame for the greens’ lack of success on their inability to make their message 
‘sexy’ – how could their efforts compete with the billions of dollars spent on marketing the world’s 
most powerful corporations?  The 1992 Rio Summit, with its unclear definitions of sustainable 
development, certainly missed the opportunity to include art or culture in the tenets (economic, 
environmental, social) of Agenda 21.   
 
Reflections on water: diverse definitions of art and ecology 
 
The Third World Water Forum did initiate the Virtual Water Forum, a process of information 
gathering that targeted the participation and attendance of otherwise excluded people and 
   Waterfornts of Art III . Public Art & Urban Design: Interdisciplinary and Social Perspectives 
  
 
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communities, thus expanding the notion of ‘stakeholder’. Another addition was that of an 
integrated Arts Festival.  Although Israeli eco-artist, Shai Zakai had been included in her 
government’s delegation to Johannesburg, that event did not recognise art per se.  Kyoto, 
however, included presentations from both Zakai and myself as eco-artist stakeholders and held 
many performance and visual arts events dedicated to the interpretation and understanding of the 
phenomenon of water – illustrating the inseparable role of nature and art in Japanese culture.  
 
In the flow of time: a case study of ecological arts practice as research 
 
Another 3rd World Water Forum event was the Anglo/Japanese arts seminar organised by 
Crossover UK.  This was held at the Honen-in Temple and included the temple’s Buddhist priest 
who presented further connections between nature, art and water.  ‘In the flow of time…’ made 
the distinction between ecological arts practice and the illustrative and interpretative water 
focused works of the other artists.  The use of formal research questions and the development of 
a dialogical methodology were shown to be key to ecological arts practice. 
 
River Life 3000: a dialogue for the beginning of time 
 
In addition to acknowledging the contribution made by many people to the exhibition, this 
presentation was an interim case study of the programme of ecological art.  Commissioned by the 
Shrewsbury Museum and Art Gallery, the programme of projects that started by questioning the 
UK Environment Agency’s Report for a Flood Defence Strategy for Shrewsbury had produced 
some encouraging outcomes.  These included: 
 
three-year Arts Council of England funding for an arts mentoring scheme to explore the effects of 
Climate Change in the County of Shropshire 
 
a Living River Archive to continue to contribute local comments the Museum’s collection 
 
a River Life tour of the exhibition to communities along the full length of the River Severn. 
 
However, riparian development has increased as the local authority and the town’s Traders’ 
Association recognise the commercial value of their river.  So, despite the support River Life 3000 
afforded the Borough’s Countryside Unit in reforestation and the Sustainability Officer in her 
promotion of  biodiversity and renewable resources, the Planning Department has escalated its 
floodplain building programme.  Indeed much of the new construction work has been of Council 
buildings sited on low-cost, high flood risk land that is now protected by the new flood defences. 
 
The Proposal 
 
Our Western culture demands that urban development is a given strategy for the furtherance of 
our increasing species and the solution to all social and economic problems – that categorised as 
non-urban being placed at the disposal of the urban for leisure and food production, thus denying 
the value of biodiversity and rural life.  A more viable and sustainable strategy may be offered 
through arts practices that contribute to the understanding of diverse aesthetics and the 
development of an eco-centric culture.  It may, also, offer a ways of mediating and even resolving 
some of the conflicts between nature and culture. 
 
The Form of Conflict 
 
Realised through the research for and making of the installation River Life 3000, certain elements 
became metaphorically significant.  The recognition of these conceptual/visual metaphors, in turn, 
suggested patterns of understanding that were expressed in proposals for further creative 
interventions in urban planning and culture.  The driving metaphor to emerge was that of ‘culture 
as a container’.   
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The defensive loop of the River Severn, in which Shrewsbury is contained, is a physical 
manifestation of its cultural identity (a mirror image may be seen in the map of Baghdad).  Living 
in relative harmony with its river, Shrewsbury changed little from its medieval founding to the late 
18th century.  The seasonal rhythm of the river provided abundant salmon, transport for trade and 
fertile floods for rich meadows and pastures.  However, as building and industry overflowed on to 
the floodplain, so the town found itself in conflict with the river’s flood-form eco-system.  The new 
flood defences may, therefore, be seen as a vain attempt to contain the river.  
 
The image of the town as cultural container was echoed in the installation’s central object, a  
clepsydra (Gk - water thief), or water clock.  From Ancient Egypt to Greece its development 
represented the first attempts to calibrate the day into regular hours, breaking seasonal shifts of 
daytime and nighttime.  In the installation, each amplified droplet that escaped to an inadequately 
sized font below prompted a moment of reflection on the temporal state of all human endeavour – 
again, a cultural container in conflict with natural rhythms and order. 
 
The paper will expand on these and several more examples to draw our attention to the pros and 
cons of cultural containers as models of urban design.  It will further develop the argument for an 
eco-centric culture based on aesthetic diversity and present this as an integral strategy for social 
inclusion.  The paper, finally, questions the appropriation of the container metaphor as a desirable 
cultural form – by whom, how and into what are we to be included? 
 
 
 
 


The Kyoto Proposal: eco-art and a form of conflict

Abstract

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Directory of Open Access Journals

Revistes CientÃfiques de la Universitat de Barcelona

Revistes Catalanes amb Accés Obert

The Kyoto Proposal: eco-art and a form of conflict

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

Directory of Open Access Journals

Revistes CientÃ­fiques de la Universitat de Barcelona

Revistes Catalanes amb Accés Obert

Revistes CientÃfiques de la Universitat de Barcelona