An Aesthetics of Minimal Resources: Affective Ecologies at the Encounter with Environmental Ethics in Alicia Barney’s Artistic Practice

Authors

• Vanessa Badagliacca, U-Tad | University Center for Technology and Digital ArtFollow

Abstract

The aim of this article is to present the early works created between 1975 and 1982 by Alicia Barney, a pioneer of environmental art in Colombia. The purpose is to highlight her ability to lead us Toward a Sustainable Attitude, the title of a conference held at the University of Venice (October 6-8, 2022), and also to claim how relevant these works remain in the current climate crisis within and beyond contemporary aesthetics debates. Taking on this approach, it will emerge that despite the attempt of the artist in some of her pieces to adopt a detached, scientific attitude in which no emotional involvement could apparently emerge, in reality she enacts an aesthetics of minimal resources that invites the spectator to look inward and think again about what a sustainable attitude can be. I would add that she activates—borrowing the expression from Carla Hustak and Natasha Myers—“‘affective ecologies’ encompassing plant, animal, and human interactions.”