SOILS TURN book launch - BERLIN
Saturday, December 6 Timebuddy
United States: 8am HST, 10am PST, 11am MST, Noon CST, 1pm EST (online)
Europe: 18:00 GMT, 19:00 CET (Doors open at 18:30)
Field Guide to Artistic Earthly Engagements presentation led by Alexandra R. Toland, with acknowledgements by Patricia Watts
Alexandra will present the recently published ecoartspace book Soils Turn, highlighting the work of over thirty distinguished soil artists, including soil essays, and a directory of over 140 soil artists, in a hybrid live x Zoom launch, accompanied by an in-store sound performance by Sam Johnstone and Sophia Fernandez.
"…human beings are not in a separate compost pile. We are humus, not Homo, not anthropos; we are compost, not posthuman." Donna Haraway
Haraway’s clarion call to reimagine human‘ as humus‘ reflects a recent ‘soils turn’ in the social sciences and humanities, and is a provocation for mainstream soil knowledge that empowers humans to reconnect with soils. Heeding this call, Soils Turn is the 2025 ecoartspace printed book, realized as a directory of artists, designers, architects, and other creatives engaging with soil materials and soil protection issues.
Under pressures of climate change, food sovereignty, pollution, and biodiversity loss, care of soils is urgently needed and must be addressed from multiple perspectives. Soils Turn is a practical guide for curators, scientists, students, policy makers and community organizers to connect with aesthetic earthly engagements.
Dr. Alexandra R. Toland is associate professor for arts and research at the Bauhaus University Weimar, where she directs the Ph.D. programme in art and design. She earned her MFA from the Dutch Art Institute (DAI) and a doctorate degree in landscape planning from the TU-Berlin as a DFG fellow in the Perspectives of Urban Ecology Graduate Research Group. Toland has held lectures and published on topics of art and environment, especially in context of soil protection issues, air pollution, and urban ecology. She co-chaired the German Soil Science Society’s (DBG) Commission on Soils in Education and Society (2011-2015), and since 2022 is IUSS co-chair of the Commission on the History, Philosophy and Sociology (and Arts) of Soil Science. Toland coedited the book Field to Palette: Dialogues on Soil and Art in the Anthropocene published by Routledge (2019). In her artistic practice, she explores social and cultural issues of urban soils, vegetation, and air in the Anthropocene, and has exhibited works, for example, at Ars Electronica (Prix Honorary Mention in 2017), Museum Schloß Moyland, the German Hygiene Museum Dresden, the Centre for Contemporary Art Glasgow, and Art Laboratory Berlin.
This event is free for all. Participants MUST REGISTER to receive the Zoom link.
