“Face the cow”: reconnecting to nature and increasing capacities for pro-environmental agency

Arts-based practices can support sustainability, combined with research that points out needs for intervention. We practiced environmental sensitivity and dialogic art with fifth-grade school pupils as part of an International Socially Engaged Art Symposium (ISEAS2019). Using arts-based action research methodology, our case study focused on the opportunities of arts-based environmental education in advancing the management of meadows and wood-pastures. We explored nature connectedness and pro-environmental mindsets and behaviors among the pupils and artists/researchers. The artistic results encompassed the dialogic interactions of the intervention, exhibited artworks, and audiovisual documentation. Using the leverage points framework, we detected key levers in conservation of meadows and wood-pastures, based on literature and the current study through a content analysis on the collected reflective materials. The participants emphasized engaging with agricultural nature in multiple ways, through doing and feeling. Arts-based practices allowed participants to recognize their corporality and develop an experiental, expressive, and informed connection with nature. Based on discussions on the general ideologies and values underlying the intervention, we conclude that promoting a stewardship philosophy towards agricultural nature would benefit its conservation. Arts-based environmental education has great potential in advancing such transition, if the multidimensionality of the interaction between people and nature is acknowledged.

以艺术为基础的实践可助力可持续发展，且相关研究亦明确了开展干预举措的必要性。作为2019年国际社会参与艺术研讨会（International Socially Engaged Art Symposium, ISEAS2019）的组成部分，我们面向五年级小学生开展了环境敏感性培养与对话艺术相关实践。本研究采用以艺术为基础的行动研究方法论（Arts-based action research methodology），案例研究聚焦于以艺术为基础的环境教育在推进草甸与林牧地管理方面的应用潜力。我们探究了小学生与艺术家/研究者群体的自然联结感（nature connectedness）、亲环境思维模式与行为表现。本次实践产出的艺术成果涵盖了干预过程中的对话互动、展出艺术作品以及音视频记录资料。基于现有文献与本研究数据，我们通过对收集到的反思性材料开展内容分析法（content analysis），借助杠杆点框架（leverage points framework）识别出了草甸与林牧地保护的关键干预杠杆。参与人员强调，需通过实践与感知，以多元方式融入农业自然环境。以艺术为基础的实践帮助参与人员认识到自身的具身性，并建立起兼具体验性、表达性与认知性的自然联结。基于对本次干预背后的核心意识形态与价值观念的探讨，我们得出结论：推广面向农业自然的管护理念（stewardship philosophy），将有助于其保护工作。若能正视人与自然互动的多维属性，以艺术为基础的环境教育在推进这类转型方面将拥有巨大潜力。