Table Of ContentField to Palette
Dialogues on Soil and Art in the Anthropocene
Alexandra R. Toland Jay Stratton Noller Gerd Wessolek
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Cover Image: Lara Almarcegui, Aushub aus Basel (Excavation materials from Basel),
Kunsthaus Baselland, 2015.
Photo: Serge Hasenböhler.
Image reprinted with permission of the artist.
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To Tilia and Taavi, and the future generation
of soil stewards the world over
Foreword
People are intimately connected to the soil. The study of the soil would
easily be the most vibrant and well-funded scientific discipline in the
universe—if only all humans realized the importance of that intimate
connection. That is not the case. Most people of the planet will never
see a soil profile, be enthralled by the beauty of argillans, or watch
stagnating water over a textural discontinuity, nor will they partake a deep
understanding of the importance of soil for our daily livelihood. There is
great beauty in the soil and although humankind may not overwhelmingly
realize the importance of soil, there is potential to enhance its appreciation
through the arts. See here the purpose of this book: an eclectic collection
of unexpected enlightening, a global journey balancing art and science.
The first depictions of soil profiles were made long before soil science as a
scientific discipline was established. In many art galleries across the world,
there are paintings of landscapes, usually from the seventeenth century
onward. They illustrate how artists viewed the landscape but also how the
naturalists’ view and the countryside have changed over time. Landscape
painting was particularly popular in Europe. Hans Jenny (1899–1992) was
a dedicated visitor of art galleries and to him soils were highly aesthetic.
In the late 1960s he wrote an article on the image of soil in landscape art
from medieval times to the mid-1900s. In nineteen paintings he discussed
medieval rocks, Renaissance paintings, landscapes of the noble moods,
trends toward naturalism, Mediterranean painters, red soils, and the
abstract landscape. The old landscape painters saw things that most other
humans failed to see. They painted soil features that we now recognize
as podzols (Jan van Goyen), paleosols (Jacob van Ruysdael), oxisols (Paul
Gauguin), or vertisols (George Lambert). At the time they were painted,
these soils had no name and no description, and soil science had yet to be
established. We can look at these early soil depictions and note that there
is an element of great aesthetics. Perhaps, there was the hidden invitation
to study what was seen and the arts may have opened the eyes for the
science to follow.
v
This book follows in that belief. The book contains a series of dialogues
between artists and soil scientists about the cultural meaning and value of
soil and the way it is studied for practical purposes or simply for the need
to understand our natural world. There is deep reflection on the aesthetic
value of the soil and its importance for humankind. If one thing becomes
clear reading this book it is that the pursuit for discovery is a common
thread among artists and soil scientists alike. Hats off to the editors and
all contributors for a unique book that connects different people on a
natural resource on which so much depends: the soil! Let us hope that the
dialogues presented in this book may open the eyes of a new generation,
now and in the future. May they take up a shovel, an auger, as well as the
pen and palette. May they wander the fields and imagine all we do not
know yet.
Alfred E. Hartemink
Department of Soil Science, FD Hole Soils Lab
University of Wisconsin-Madison
Madison, Wisconsin
E-mail: [email protected]
vi | Foreword
Introduction
Alexandra R. Toland, Gerd Wessolek,
Jay Stratton Noller
Field to Palette – Dialogues on Soil and Art in the Anthropocene is an
investigation of the cultural meanings, representations, and values of soil
in a time of planetary change. It is a critical reflection on soil-related
issues of the Anthropocene, including land take, groundwater pollution,
desertification, and biodiversity loss. It is also a celebration of resilience in
the face of such challenges and a call to action. The title of the book is on
the one hand a nod to grassroots social organizing and locally controlled
food production methods developed by “field to plate” movements
worldwide. On the other hand, it is a call to the field of soil science for
increased interdisciplinary engagement with the arts and humanities.
With contributions from over one hundred internationally renowned
artists, curators, and leading environmental scientists, Field to Palette
presents a set of visual methodologies and worldviews that expand our
understanding of soil.
Inspired by the rich biological and pedological diversity of soil types found
in terrestrial landscapes the world over, we used diversity as a guiding
principal in the selection of book contributions. Special attention was
given to ensure gender and cultural diversity as well as representation from
different geographic locations. Scientists included in the book represent
a wide range of disciplinary interests, from agronomy and crop science
to geomorphology, soil hydrology, microbiology, physical geography, and
environmental engineering. Artistic positions were similarly chosen to
represent a broad range of creative formats, with examples from the visual
and performing arts, architecture, landscape design, product design, textile
design, culinary arts, and film. For the sake of diversity, the authors do not
merely visualize the physical, aesthetic properties of soil, such as color or
texture, but explore a wide range of cultrual articulations, moving between
attraction and disgust, dependence and exploitation, reverence and loss,
use and degradation.
vii
The chapters in this book are framed as dialogues among different
disciplines and individuals that come together as a chorus of lively voices.
The slogan “Give Soil a Voice” often comes up in soil awareness and
education discussions. For this book, we wanted to hear the voices of
those who give soil a voice. We wanted to hear stories of the past and
visions of the future. We wanted to hear expert opinions in the form of
research narratives, critical questioning, and sometimes disagreement. We
wanted to hear the voices of prominent scientists as well as those who do
not usually attend scientific meetings but have something important to
say about soil. We wanted to facilitate dialogue because we believe that
dialogue is a fundamental process of change and is often overlooked in soil
protection contexts that value data over discourse and policy statements
over human experience.
The result of that process is a rich volume of authentic exchanges about
the material properties, cultural histories, environmental functions, and
existential threats of the soil in a range of different practices, places and
cultural traditions. It is a collection of conversations in different formats
and time frames, some carried out over many months and even years,
others as fleeting exchanges via email. While the chapter topics are
relatively straightforward, the style and personal tenor of the writing
fluctuates from solemn to humorous, fictional to factual, poetic to prosaic,
and objectively distanced to deeply personal.
Based on variables of research interests and geographic proximity (which
in some cases only meant living on the same continent) we conducted
an interdisciplinary “matchmaking” experiment to connect people who
otherwise would not likely have come in contact with one another. In some
cases this was a success. In other cases, disciplinary differences, human
chemistry, time and geographical restraints, or factors unbeknownst
to us truncated the process. Over the course of four years, the list of
contributors shifted multiple times, as did the publishing relationship,
the title, and the structural focus of the book. By no means an exhaustive
overview, this book represents instead an iterative and relational process of
bringing scientists and artists together to share perspectives on human-soil
relationships and their importance for the existence of life on the planet.
The perspectives shared here are as heterogeneous as the interests
of the participating authors and point to an important aspect of
the interdisciplinary experiment itself. In many cases disciplinary
boundaries are diffuse, revealing a complex web of methodological and
epistemological impulses that challenge assumptions about artistic and
scientific practice. About half of the artists in the book have some degree
viii | Introduction
of training in different scientific fields and view their work as research.
Meanwhile, a good number of contributing scientists openly discuss the
aesthetic aspects of their work, and a handful actively paint, photograph,
write poetry, or pursue other artistic endeavors.
To honor the complexity of interdisciplinarity and avoid a repetition of
well-intentioned but generalized exchanges, we needed to focus efforts
around specific ideas. In transdisciplinary stake-holder processes boundary
objects are often used to do just this. Boundary objects, according to
sociologists and Science Technology Society (STS) scholars Susan Leigh
Star and James Griesemer (1989),1 are conceptual entities that bridge
different understandings of information by different user groups. Boundary
objects are interpreted differently depending on the group, but contain
enough content to allow members of different disciplines and social groups
to talk and work together. Boundary objects, which can be material or
theoretical in nature, must be specific enough to keep discussions focused
and avoid superficiality, but general enough to allow new ideas and
possibly new boudary objects to emerge and conversation to remain open.
Boundary objects both “inhabit several communities of practice and satisfy
the informational requirements of each…” and “are both plastic enough
to adapt to local needs and constraints of the several parties employing
them, yet robust enough to maintain a common identity across sites” (Star,
2015).2
For a long time, we debated what these could be. Current soil science
research topics? Artistic genres? Land use conflicts of the Anthropocene?
We initially looked at the internal organizational structure of the
International Union of Soil Sciences for clues. Established concepts of
soil genesis, soil organic matter (SOM), and soil security served as initial
boundary objects at the outset of the book. Based on earlier research,
however, we finally decided to focus on the concept of soil functions as
boundary objects for the dialogue process of the book.3 Whether we speak
of structural functions, environmental functions, political functions, bodily
functions, or aesthetic functions, we can agree that “function” is a term
that is widely used and accepted by various groups. Philippe Baveye, citing
Kurt Jax (2005) describes four common uses of the term, before unpacking
its meaning for soil scientific inquiry. Function, according to Baveye, is
understood as:
1. a state change in time (more or less synonymous to “process”),
2. as a shorthand notation for “functioning” (referring to some state
or trajectory of a given system, and to the sum of the processes that
sustain the system),
Introduction | ix
