December 2025 e-Newsletter for subscribers and non-members is  here

When Earth Speaks: A Dirty Ensemble by Miranda Whall, film stills from the film by Amy Daniel, 2024

When Earth Speaks: Miranda Whall on Drawing, Performance Data and Gentle Activism

This month’s interview with Miranda Whall, based in Wales (UK), was conducted by fellow ecoartspace member and performance artist Colette Copeland (TX, US). 

Whall studied at UWIC Cardiff, Emily Carr Institute, Vancouver, the Royal Academy Schools, and Goldsmiths, University of London, and was the recipient of a creative commission from UKRI CO2RE – Greenhouse Gas Removal Hub, Oxford University 2025 – 2026 for When Peat Speaks (2025–26). In 2024, she was awarded the inaugural Live Art Rural UK Fellowship by the Live Art Development Agency (LADA). Whall has been a co-investigator on several recent NERC-funded cross-disciplinary projects and works at the intersection of performance, expanded drawing, film and environmental science. She is the director and performer of two recent stage productions When Seeds Speak: A Seedy Ensemble, Seligman Theatre, Chapter Arts Centre, Cardiff 2024, and When Earth Speaks: A Dirty Ensemble, Aberystwyth Arts Centre 2024. 

Her work was included in the groundbreaking exhibition Soil: The World at Our Feet at Somerset House, London early in 2024, work that is also featured in the current ecoartspace publication Soils Turn. Whall is a postgraduate and PhD research supervisor and lecturer in Fine Art at Aberystwyth University, a creative coach, and mentor for Arts Council Wales.

When Earth Speaks: A Dirty Ensemble by Miranda Whall, photos by Ashley Calvert, 2024

CC: Miranda, there is so much to unpack with your work. While it is very complex your website beautifully clarifies your concepts and process. As I reflect, a few threads recur: collaboration with humans and other-than-humans, embodiment—embodying process, embodying data, embodying what cannot be seen, the role of the artist as a witness and as you eloquently described in one article “gentle activism.”

Let’s begin with collaboration. In your performance works, you collaborate with scientists, filmmakers, dancers and musicians, but also with other-than-humans who inhabit the land. You’ve collaborated with trees in your crawling performances. In the series When Peat Speaks, When Earth Speaks and When Seeds Speak, you collaborate directly with all the living aspects in the environment. Data is also a key component in these works.

How do you approach collaborating with non-sentient beings such as data and how do you negotiate that relationship in your spoken word performances and durational drawings? 

MW: Thank you Colette for your generous and layered questions, it is a great pleasure and privilege to spend time answering them. In my recent and current work, I am attempting a non-anthropocentric, non-sentimental, post-humanist approach, and so there is purposefully no direct influence running in either direction, between me and the data, and no decision-making based on what the data is actually conveying. I am not translating the data, adjusting my drawing, composition, or musicality in response to it. And I am not interpreting it or aestheticizing it. Similarly, the data is not communicating, responding, or negotiating with me. The data and I, and the musicians and dancers, simply coexist. I ask the collaborators to think about the material ecology the soil, seed, or peat, but not about the data per se. My drawings, sculptures, and performances unfold through their own internal logic, and the data unfolds through its own internal logic. Neither bends toward the other. They meet only because they occur in the same temporal and spatial field. What is shared is time, not meaning, and an appreciation of that fact that we don’t understand each other. We are like parallel systems, or, as I like to think of it, like friends who are comfortable enough to coexist in silence.

This way of being together establishes a deliberately matter-of-fact relationship rather than an expressive or interpretive one. I am interested in a refusal to translate, a refusal to respond, and a refusal to represent. The data is allowed to remain data, and I am allowed to remain human, and we encounter each other and the gap between us. I am drawn to the illegibility and impenetrability of vast numerical fields; their opacity and strangeness are part of the data’s presence. I see other artwork with data leaning towards anthropomorphizing, where it is treated as if it has intention, character, or narrative, in my thinking—this can be left to the scientists. What I am interested in is a non-anthropomorphic empathy: staying with what is strange about it, and problematic with it, and so ‘staying with its trouble’.

Translation, where it might happen momentarily, for example in the collaborative performances, is without sentimentality; this is why I work with improv musicians rather than composers and interpretive, or score-based musicians. Patterns in the data stream might be followed; errors and absences might be noticed, but they simply prompt improvisation that moves quickly on. The musicians and dancers do not attempt to sonify, translate, mirror, or respond to the data itself. The performers are not improvising to it, synchronizing with it, or using it as a score. Their actions unfold according to their own internal logics, durations, and constraints, just as the drawings do. Instead, sound, movement, drawing, and data occupy the same temporal field in a kind of non-negotiable way. They run alongside each other as independent systems, co-present but non-interactive. The ‘ensemble’ is therefore not built on dialogue or responsiveness, but on simultaneity and coexistence.

Underlying this approach is a shift from using data to being-with data. I treat it both as raw material and as a co-presence: a non–sentient being whose behavior I spend time with and witness. My role shifts from author to mediator, or caretaker of a material that simply keeps being generated.

A Boggy Gassy Cloud: Jumping in progress by Miranda Whall, photo by Ashley Calvert, 2025

CC: Your body is always active in the durational data drawings and in spoken word performances, live and on film. Many artists visualize data; you embody it to cultivate environmental awareness and empathy.

Could you walk us through your preparation—somatic, cognitive, and technical for your durational work? How do endurance and concept inform one another in your practice? When does time become a method, and when does it become the material? 

MW: My preparation for durational work is practical and rather mundane. I don’t do somatic or cognitive warm-ups in a performance sense. Instead, I make sure I have set the right conditions: that I have enough time, and that I have all the right equipment, tools, and materials to enable me to step into the temporal and spatial field, a bit like preparing for a long walk into the mountains.

In the Boggy Gassy Drawing I have just finished, where I inscribed half a million digits in ink onto a 152 × 101 cm sheet of paper. I set myself the task of writing in increments of one thousand data points, roughly 6,000 digits per hour, and to work for around four hours a day, inscribing approximately 28,000 digits. At the beginning of the process, I worked in 30-minute increments set by my phone alarm. Both approaches gave me clear goalposts and a reward system that made the work sustainable. Someone once suggested that I allow myself to fall into the process more deeply, over longer, unbroken periods, but that would have made the work unsustainable—I would burn out, damage my body, and ultimately render the work impossible.

When making my drawings or pin-pricked Boggy Gassy Cloud, I make sure I am warm in my studio, stable enough—physically and mentally—to stay with one task for a long time. This usually means very basic things: checking posture, organizing the space so I can reach what I need, confirming that batteries are charged and cables inserted correctly. In the breaks, I make drinks, look out of the studio window, stretch, catch up with emails, or message people I have been thinking about during the work. 

The mindset while writing/drawing is sometimes very challenging. When caught within what can feel like an endless stream of numbers, reciting internally, thousands of digits, the process can be mentally demanding. Because I cannot escape the stream, move or leave the activity, a single negative thought can get stuck and loop itself again and again, becoming difficult to manage and, at times, overwhelming. 

I can’t listen to podcasts, but I can and do listen to certain kinds of music, for example, Arvo Pärt or Max Richter. The nature of their music is slow, repetitive, restrained, with limited harmonic movement, and a steady temporal pulse. The music fills and holds time without demanding my attention. It somehow supports the durational work rather than distracts from it.

The Boggy Gassy Bubbly Ensemble, photos by Ash Calvert and film stills by Gilly Booth, hijack film

I keep the structure very clear. I decide the rule I will follow and once the work begins, I do not adapt or interpret. The rules hold. The data runs, and I run alongside it. We remain independent. Technically, the setup is precise but not complicated. When there are sensors involved—the ‘talkie boxes’ (custom-made microcontrollers), I check that they are working properly i.e., speaking to the sensor network in the peatbog for example, but I do not react to what the sensors generate. In When Peat Speaks: A Boggy Cloudy Bubbly Ensemble, for example, the real-time peat data runs continuously from the sensor network installed on the peat bog, but my own and the musicians’ actions do not change because of it. Our bodies and the data simply occupy the same time frame.

Duration and concept meet in this non-interactive commitment. The duration creates the conditions: staying in one action long enough so that it becomes factual, almost procedural. The concept is sustained by endurance rather than expressiveness. I follow the instructions I have set for as many hours as it takes, and drawings and sculptures accumulate because time accumulates; nothing is performed in response to the data.

Time becomes a method when it is the structure that holds the process in place. Speaking numbers continuously for an hour, for instance, forces a mechanical pacing that does not rely on emotional interpretation. Time becomes the material when the trace of that pacing, on paper for example, shows the body doing one thing for a long period. The content does not shift, but the body inevitably registers fatigue, pressure, and repetition.

The main idea is that I do not try to embody the data in an expressive way. I do not translate it, react to it, or use it to guide my actions. My body is simply present with it. The data continues as data, and I continue as myself. The work comes from the coexistence of those two ecologies over time.

CC: Your projects generate extensive documentation, yet the films operate as artworks in their own right—with an uncanny, sci-fi charge that feels dreamlike or like an alien encounter. The lighting and sound deepen that sense of mystery and otherworldliness.

How do you envision the films functioning within the larger project—evidence, portal, score, autonomous work, or something else? What are the relationships between fieldwork, documentation, live performance and film?

MW: The films sit in a deliberately ambiguous position within the larger projects. They are not straightforward documentation, and they are not simply autonomous artworks either, although they can operate as both. I think of them less as evidence and more as a kind of trace of what has happened in a performance, maybe a witness, but they do not attempt to explain it. What matters to me is not recording what took place but creating another platform where the work can continue to unfold in a different temporal and sensory register.

I love that you have picked up on the uncanny, sci-fi quality of the films. I have been surprised and so pleased that both filmmakers; Amy Daniel and Gilly Booth (Hijack film), who made the films of the three ensembles performed so far, have created this atmosphere. This has emerged through their own interpretations, or sensed readings of the ensemble performances, and perhaps also from my own articulation of a refusal and resistance to representation.

If you are referring specifically to the films of the tree-crawling projects, which I filmed and edited myself, I think it is Bert Barton’s tree-generated composition, which forms the soundtrack to the crawls, that so strongly defines the atmosphere of that series of films. 

In the recent filming of the Dirty, Seedy and Boggy ensembles, the films do not tell the viewer what the data means, or what the action signifies, instead, they sustain a sense of strangeness, opacity, and distance that feels closer to how I experience the work in situ—as something unfolding around me rather than something I am interpreting.

I think live performance and film operate as parallel but connected. The live performance is where conditions are inhabited in real time and the film attempts to engage with that experience and encounter, as present but separate. I think the films are not so much a record of the encounter but a re-materialization of it—another iteration that has its own internal logic and temporality. The film and performance affect each other, but neither of them stands in for the other.

So, the film is not a score, and it is not simply evidence. It is closer to a kind of after-image—something that carries the trace and residue of the performance, while also being autonomous.

When Seeds Speak: A Seedy Ensemble by Miranda Whall, photos by Ashley Calvert, 2024

CC: You’ve written about artists as conduits, connectors, and processors.

In your role as witness/observer, what have the earth, soil, bog, and seeds communicated to you? What does deep listening look like in practice? And how might “gentle activism” guide concrete actions that help audiences serve as conduits and connectors for the earth?

MW: The soil, seed and peat do not communicate to me in any direct or legible way. I do not experience these encounters as messages to be interpreted or translated into a meaning that humans can understand. Instead, what I hope they offer is a deeper understanding of how to be present in time, in a time different from our own human time. Through fostering a kind of attunement to the data—a language we have offered to these material ecologies, I have come to understand the slowness and density of matter, the way moisture, pressure, decay, and time shape everything quietly and without spectacle. What I learn is not content so much as scale, rhythm, and endurance. The bog has taught me about accumulation, about holding rather than revealing, about futures that are measured across centuries rather than in human attention spans.

Deep listening, in my practice, is therefore not an act of interpretation but a kind of suspension. It means ‘getting out of the way’ or ‘staying with,’ setting aside the impulse to extract meaning, to represent, and to narrate. ‘Being with’ the data and one repetitive action for a long, uncomfortable time, without the anticipation of an outcome, becomes a form of protest or resistance. It involves mindless boredom, fatigue, and discomfort as much as insight. I believe there is a kind of profundity in the mundane. I have always been drawn to the overlooked, and in this current work it is through sitting with the overlooked—the soil, seed, and peat, that a form of deep listening is cultivated, and with it, a gentle insistence that this is worth doing.

I invite audiences into durational encounters where nothing is resolved or explained. Thousands of numbers are deposited onto a sheet of paper and add up to nothing more than the sum of their parts—no form, no image, no picture, just the material evidence of repetitive action over time. Audiences are asked to look into these ink-on-paper data landscapes or clouds, or to step onto the bog, to share time with material processes that exceed them.

The activism is gentle because it does not instruct people what to think or feel; it instead offers a space in which they might begin to sense their own position within larger material, ecological, and temporal systems—planetary systems. To serve as conduits and connectors for the earth, in this sense, is not to speak on its behalf, but to learn how to walk into it, and to sit with it. I believe that if we can learn to sit with material ecologies, to remain in their company, we can learn to understand their value beyond resource.

More on Miranda Whall here

Miranda Whall, Multimodal Project When Earth Speaks

November 2025 e-Newsletter for subscribers and non-members is here

Corals from Laguna de Maya Cuba ©Luis Muiño

Forms Fostering Growth: Mara G Haseltine’s NGO “Geotherapy Institute for Art and Field Sciences” Builds Nurseries for Coral Reef Restoration in Cuba

Olivia Carye Hallstein

Artist Mara G Haseltine, Director of the “Geotherapy Institute for Art and Field Sciences,” has developed her first project for coral nurseries in Laguna de Maya, Cuba.  She has expanded her creative work to collaboratively produce an effective regenerative solution for bleaching coral. As a result, The Coral Nursery applies creativity with restoration within a non-profit framework. Working as an official business entity coordinating with local government and other institutions allows the project to surpass common limitations. 

Geotherapy Institute For Art and Field Sciences official Logo

Mara, your project and NGO address coral bleaching in Cuba. What factors did you take into consideration when deciding on location for this project?

Corals are the ‘canary in the coalmine’ for our planet. When healthy, they soften the shorelines creating natural self-healing beach-breaks, create biodiverse habitats for a myriad of aquatic life, create sustainable fishing opportunities, and offer endless opportunities for scientific research including medicine. These delicate biodiverse habitats are headed for mass extinction and preserving them through anthropogenic means is now our only window into their past glory for future generations.

Cuban waters of course are undergoing the same effects of climate change that we are seeing globally. And there are many Cuban nationals working on this topic in different ways. Acidification and temperature rise both create large-scale bleaching leading to the decimation of coral reefs worldwide.  However, Cuba has little or no agricultural runoff from fertilizers used to farm, drastically less commercial building, and less automobile traffic. As a result, there is much less pollution going into the sea surrounding Cuba, making it far more pristine than the surrounding islands in the Caribbean. This makes it a better place to do coral restoration and study the effects of coral restoration scientifically.  

And to restore these corals you have expanded this project by launching The Coral Nursery in Havana, Cuba as an NGO. What has your process of starting an NGO and working amongst scientific institutions as an artist looked like?

I see my specialty as an artist as ‘making the microscopic megascopic’; sometimes on a very large scale. Art is a wonderful tool for public engagement and can make something so visually seductive that the viewer wants to learn more about it to ‘understand’ and thus be compelled to engage with the work. 

The creation of this NGO ‘the Geotherapy Institute for Art and Field Sciences’ and becoming its Director is another level of magnification. There are so many moving parts and it has become organic in its growth, taking on a life of its own. We are building an unstoppable team all dedicated to infusing art into the field sciences: with students and Professors from the University of Havana, Finca Artnomista (a sustainible organic farm), Cuban artists like Isrealito Matanzas and NGO’s like Cresta, the Global Coral Reef Alliance and The Ocean Foundation. 

The word ‘Geotherapy’ acknowledges that we are in the age of the Anthropocene. It is our moral duty to care for our injured biosphere with ‘nature-based’ solutions as a doctor would tend to a sick patient.  My goal with this project and subsequent projects is to create something so poetic that this vital relationship we have with nature cannot be ignored. In the end, you will not see the reef structures we have carefully crafted but a vibrant healthy reef…

I have been a practicing ‘environmental sci-artist’ working with scientists and scientific teams for over twenty-five years. The intense connections and inspiration that come from learning about the science has been a source of inspiration as well as one of camaraderie. I am drawn to people that think outside the box (and sometimes very differently from me). I firmly believe that scientists are like artists in their approach to problem solving… striving for solutions that have not yet been created. 

Coral nursery model ©Mara G Haseltine

Problem solving by “Making the microscopic megascopic” sounds like a great way to describe this project! So, how does it work? 

My design is for a coral nursery. The ceramic stars have cross-bred gametes using a process called ‘sextual coral larval propagation’. The stars have cross-bred gametes individually placed on them by scientists who capture the gametes during full moon spawning events. Crossbreeding strengthens their immunity which is crucial in acidic and warmer waters due to climate change. The nursery grows these corals on the ceramic stars until the nascent corals are ready to be placed on top of the reef with a sextual coral larval propagation design component. 

My theory is that the lightly electrified nursery structures will also increase the survivability of these cross-bred gametes. The corals we are focusing on are hard corals like stag and elkhorn both from the Acropora genus; they are endangered. As the reef builders upon which many other forms of life and coral attach to or lay eggs or nest in, they play a crucial role.

Ceramic substrates for coral larval propagation © Mara G Haseltine

What a fantastic example of research-based design. As an artist, I am curious to hear: what contributed to your design decisions for shape and material?

I chose the shape because I found it beautiful, but also functional. The domed structure with a flat bottom and flanges make it incredibly sturdy, which is crucial for aquatic environments. Corals create energy in two ways through catching tiny nutrient particles that float nearby and through photosynthesis through symbiotic algae called xoonathalle, the design has open space for nutrients to flow through and sunlight to reach to aide these functions.

For the stars I chose high fire ceramics, because they have low porosity and perfect for sub-aquatic environments and added a coral texture for the gametes to cling too. The Biorock method employed for the metal structures which applies light volts of electricity to metal, creating an accretion process coating the metal with layers of calcium carbonate. This is the same substance coral skeletons are made from, which if grown properly creates a self-healing substrate 5x’s the strength of traditional concrete.  The light volts of electricity boost the immune system of corals attached to the structure and in nearby waters. 

Plankton pod © Mara G Haseltine

It seems like, just as you are nursing the complex ecosystem of these coral reefs, you are also fostering a parallelly diverse community onshore. With so many people involved in different ways, what hopes do you have for this project beyond the coral reefs? 

We have built an incredible team, over the past three years of working on this project. I could never have done this single-handedly. Some of the scientists and explorers working on this project have been colleagues for over twenty years, bringing a depth of knowledge to the project one person alone could never do. 

I envision a future where many other artists and scientists can come and collaborate, creating an underwater sculpture park that champions ‘nature-based’ solutions. I also hope Laguna de Maya becomes known globally for its dedication to art, local culture, science and above all stewardship for the planet.  

A healthy reef is diverse, the stake holders in this project are diverse as well and there can be many positive outcomes from educational documentary films to sustainable fishing, eco-tourism and above all hope for a brighter future - the possibilities are endless…

Thank you, Mara, for sharing your valuable insights and work! 

Mara G Haseltine teaching in Cuba © Mau Abascal

October 2025 e-Newsletter for subscribers and non-members is here

Through her circular sculpture, artist Rachel Frank depicts the American Oystercatcher in its tide-pool habitat. Photo: Sydney Walsh/Audubon

The Hidden World of the American Oystercatcher

Inspired by ancient offering vessels, Rachel Frank’s sculpture captures the delicate cycle of a shorebird’s life in the intertidal zone.

Words by Jessica McKenzie, Reporter, Audubon magazine, published Fall 2025

Sculptors often spend a lot of time with their subjects, but Rachel Frank takes that connection to another level. As a rehabilitator at the Wild Bird Fund in Manhattan, she’s cared for an array of creatures that live in or pass through the city, including rodenticide-poisoned owls, kestrels injured by cats, and diseased hawks. Her intimate knowledge of wildlife infuses the ceramic sculptures she creates in her Brooklyn studio.

Originally from a small town in northern Kentucky, Frank grew up working with horses and helping out on family farms. When she moved to New York City in 2005, she missed those regular encounters with animals and nature. So while working as a sculptor and art instructor, she began volunteering for the Wild Bird Fund and then signed on full time after she lost her teaching job during the pandemic. Now she is in charge of one of the most diverse departments: waterfowl, raptors, and—surprisingly, given the facility’s name—turtles. “There’s very different treatments between a lot of these different species,” Frank says, “but I really like the challenge.”

Artist Rachel Frank, with her commissioned piece for The Aviary, in her studio in Brooklyn, New York on July 15, 2025. Photo: Sydney Walsh/Audubon

Some of the standouts on Frank’s long list of patients are the American Oystercatchers that have come into her care with wing injuries and swallowed fish hooks. The large black and white shorebird, which inhabits quieter patches of New York City beaches like the Rockaways and Jamaica Bay, is instantly recognizable: “It has such a bright, orangish-red beak, and a haunting, whistling, kind of laughing call,” Frank says.

The artist features this distinctive species in her piece for The Aviary, titled “Liminal Offering Vessel: American Oystercatcher and Tide Pools.” The statue’s shape was inspired by ancient Mediterranean vessels called ring-kernos, circular pieces with bowls attached to hold offerings of honey, oil, wine, or grains. Frank likes working in this form because of its long history and rich symbolism; many of the earliest ceramics were vessels. “I’m interested in sculptural objects that are tied to ideas of exchange, connection, movement, and ritual,” she says.

Continue reading article at Audubon magazine here

Connecting with Community and the Land: A Workshop on Sustainability in Art & Life

by Colette Copeland September 8, 2025 l Glasstire

Last month, I spent a week living and learning at Chelenzo, an organic farm outside of Santa Fe in Cerillos, New Mexico. Patricia Watts, curator, writer, and founder of ecoartspace — a global community of environmentally focused artists, scientists, and advocates — organized a retreat-style workshop that asked participants to understand materiality through traditional and sustainable methods in artmaking. We learned to make adobe bricks and natural plant dyes, and we did it together, living and working as a community.

I’ve been an ecoartspace member for about a year, attending many of their Zoom lectures by artists and scientists, and this was my first in-person meetup with fellow members. It can be tricky to live, eat, and work alongside relative strangers, but this week was drama-free: everyone arrived excited to learn, interact, and collaborate. Lorenzo and Chelsea Dominguez and their family cooked organic, fresh-picked food from the farm and we all came home a few pounds healthier and happier from the meals and good company.

The farm offers majestic vistas and hiking trails. Each morning, I walked to engage my senses and set an intention for the day. For urban dwellers, the absence of traffic noise and clean air is grounding and healing.

Mornings were spent with workshop leader Jeanne Dodds, an artist, conservationist, researcher, and educator whose creative practice embraces connections and materiality with non-humans. Dodds taught us about the ethical harvesting of plant materials and we created contact prints on fabric using sunflowers grown on the farm.

Continue reading on Glasstire here

September 2025 e-Newsletter for subscribers and non-members is here

The Ecological Power of Contemporary Art:

An Interview with Aviva Rahmani on Art and Ecology, an American artist who combines feminism, activism, and environmental renewal in a single practice of social commitment

originally published May 31, 2025 via Art Tribune online, interview by Antonino La Vela

Aviva Rahmani (New York, 1945) is an artist who combines creativity with a commitment to environmental and cultural renewal. At the heart of her work is the Aviva Rahmani Eco-Art Project, which includes works such as Blued Trees, Ghost Nets, Cities and Oceans of If, and Gulf to Gulf. These projects denounce humankind's destructive impact on the environment and ecocide, inviting audiences to reevaluate their connection to an environment that is fundamental to our cultural identity.

Who is Aviva Rahmani With a solid background in art and environmental studies, Rahmani has developed theories that challenge traditional conventions. Her work combines conceptualism with cultural criticism, intertwining historical narratives and literary legacies, connecting the past to today's social changes, making them symbols of resilience and renewal. We discussed her practice in this interview.

Interview with Aviva Rahmani

Let's start from the beginning. What role can your cultural and landscape experiences, your sensitivity to nature, and your exploration of performance and conceptual art play in environmental renewal?

My earliest memories, linked to nature and an insatiable curiosity for the world, drew me to performance and conceptual art. As a young artist, I wanted to express both my creative impulses and growing environmental concerns. These experiences laid the foundation for my work, which I call Trigger Point Theory as Aesthetic Activism. Confronting phenomena such as deforestation, pollution, and ecocide has driven me to create art that aims to spark real transformations in the relationship between humanity and the environment.

The projects Blued Trees, Ghost Nets, Cities and Oceans of If, and Gulf to Gulf have become fundamental in this field. What message do you intend to convey?

Each of my works stems from the belief that a small gesture can make a difference to the environment. Blued Trees and Ghost Nets highlight the serious consequences of ecosystem collapse, while Cities and Oceans of If and Gulf to Gulf imagine a future where urban spaces and natural environments coexist in harmony. Together, these works invite us to recognize our responsibility to the planet, reminding us that every creative gesture can contribute to healing the planet's wounds.

You have collaborated with prominent figures such as Judy Chicago, enriching your work with a feminist perspective.

Working with Judy Chicago revolutionized my concept of performative collaboration, deepening the connection between feminism and ecological activism. This experience challenged and transcended patriarchal and colonial narratives. The work Ablutions, created together with Judy, Suzanne Lacy and Sandi Orgel in 1973 on the theme of sexual violence, further strengthened my commitment to combating the colonization of the territory and social injustice, themes that have accompanied me since the early days of the feminist movement.

Your art combines science, indigenous wisdom, and cultural criticism in an original way. How do they come together in your creative process?

I consider the world a complex and interconnected system. I draw on physics, environmental studies, and indigenous traditions to construct a holistic vision that guides my work. This approach allows me to create rigorous and emotionally resonant works, highlighting the connections between ecological health, cultural identity, and the devastating consequences of ecocide. This vision opens spaces for thought and concrete action.

Despite international recognition, your work in Italy remains little-known. You presented Trigger Points / Tipping Points at the 2007 Venice Biennale, but much remains to be discovered. Italy's high artistic culture offers the ideal context for a dialogue on the environment.

I see the opportunity to engage the public more, not only by exhibiting my works, but also by stimulating profound reflection on sustainability and ecological justice. This commitment is essential at a time when global challenges, such as ecocide, require innovative and restorative solutions.

In your most recent project, Tolstoy & I, you reimagine classic literature through blue pencil self-portraits, drawn on torn pages from an old edition of War and Peace that belonged to your mother.

Tolstoy & I is an introspective journey into my personal history and my relationship with contemporary politics. Reusing pages from my mother's beloved copy of War and Peace, I grapple with the violation of history —that is, the way political forces fragment collective memory. The use of blue pencil, a reference to my project Blued Trees, creates a symbolic link between my ecological activism and literary reflection, inviting us to rediscover hidden narratives and understand how memory, legacy, and political reality are inextricably linked.

Looking to the future, what message would you like to convey to emerging artists and environmental activists today?

Embrace your creativity as a tool for transformation. Art can speak truth to power, challenge the status quo, and imagine alternative futures. I invite young artists to dare, transcend disciplinary boundaries, and use their voices to address the urgent issues of our time. Our planet needs innovation, passion, and decisive action: every creative gesture is a step toward a more sustainable and just world.

Antonino La Vela

Original article in Italian here

ecoartspace recently did a 1.5 hour interview with Aviva Rahmani in her studio in Vinalhaven, Maine (July 2025), as part of our video archive, which is available to researchers up request. 

August 2025 e-Newsletter for subscribers is here