The Art Of Environmental Discomfort With Andrew Yang
Jordan 0:00
Hello, hello everyone, and Happy New Year! We're back! Just wanted to start off and thank everyone who's been so supportive and showing us so much love. We appreciate every single one of you, which is why we're starting off your new year with one incredible guest and their story, who we actually discovered by happy accident. Let— let me set the stage. You know, one of the greatest challenges, in this current generation, is that we often feel untouched or disconnected by the problems of others, and by global issues like climate change. We do not feel strongly enough that we are part of a global community, part of a larger we. Giving people access to data most often leaves them feeling overwhelmed and disconnected, and not empowered and wanting to do action. This is where art can make a difference. And I did not truly understand that until I visited the famous Smithsonian Museum of Natural History in Washington D.C., in the United States of America. For those who don't know what the Smithsonian is, it is one of the world's most popular natural history museums, dedicated to understanding the natural world and our place in it. While I was wandering around the museum with my friend, my attention was drawn to one of their new exhibits, where the Smithsonian turned to art, and not science, to hammer home a warning about this climate crisis. In this new exhibit titled Unsettled Nature, they featured artists from around the world, as they reflect on the age of humans in relation to the Earth. This was the first art exhibition of its kind in the museum's 111 year history, where the staff decided that because the climate crisis was so complex, they didn't want to provide a single answer to this problem, but instead, wanted people to conclude that at the root of the problem is our relationship to nature, and the environment. It was within this exhibit that my mind was blown by one art installation in particular, and it was called Flying Gardens of Maybe by Andrew S. Yang.
[intro music]
Jordan 2:14
Hey, this is Jordan!
Mimi 2:15
And this is Mimi.
Jordan 2:16
And welcome to the Imperfect Eco-Hero podcast.
Mimi 2:19
The series that connects community, normalizes imperfections and empowers heroes.
[end of intro music]
Jordan 2:28
So what was Flying Gardens of Maybe? Well, this piece stood out, compared to every other piece in this exhibit, because of its striking and enthralling collection of vivid images of birds, seeds, and plants, interspersed with mirrors on top of this collection of those same plants in front of it. You know, the artist was exploring the literal collision between migrating birds and manmade structures. You know, nearly a billion birds die annually after hitting windows, and the seeds they would have dispersed, also become lost with them. I didn't know that. And so Andrew collected those birds and remove the seeds from their stomach, giving them a second chance at life in this makeshift garden. It was thought provoking and chilling, where the mirrors almost implicated the viewer—me—in this process, and while at the same time providing this glimmer of hope as well, with the circularity of life. So I knew I had to share it, you know, on our Instagram page, so all of you guys can be amazed by this piece of art too. And I had no idea that it would have led us here today, getting the opportunity to chat with Andrew himself about this piece, and about his entire body of work. Andrew Yang is fascinating. He is a Chicago based artist that draws on his dual background in biology and visual arts to create work that examines the clash between nature and culture. Andrew holds a PhD in Biology from Duke University, and an MFA in visual arts from Lesley University College of Art and Design. He is also an Associate Professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and recently is the artist in residence at Yale and NSU College. Andrew uses his art to challenge our perspective to think about the changes we make daily on our planet. Today's episode will delve into that and more as we talk about the power art has in helping us better see climate change and better connect emotionally with the enormity of climate change and all of its intersecting parts.
Mimi 4:46
Hi Andrew! We're super excited to have you on today. Jordan’s smiling because that's how I start every interview, by saying how excited I am. But I think it holds...
Jordan 4:56
It's true!
Mimi 4:56
It holds true for every guest, and especially because you've done some really, really incredible work. So I'm just going to open it up by asking you to tell us a little bit about your journey. I know you're a biologist and an artist. So a little bit about how those two arrive in your work. Yeah, so I'll just…I'll let you get started.
Andrew 5:15
Okay, yeah! Thanks a lot for having me on the show, Mimi and Jordan, I’m really looking forward to this. Yeah, so yeah, my background is in both, like, visual arts and biology. So I have a PhD in biology, but also have a MFA in visual art. And, you know, I've always been really interested in those areas. You know, growing up, I didn't really see them as distinct, but then, of course, once you get to college, you have to start making these kinds of choices. So I ended up doing most of my education in the sciences. And then, upon getting my PhD, I then actually intentionally started to apply for jobs at art schools, because I continued to have a…an art practice. But I just thought that that was the kind of environment, and the kind of students, and the kind of colleagues I wanted to have. So I…I really made a concerted effort to seek out positions in those kinds of schools. And that's how I ended up where I am now, which is the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
Jordan 6:12
That's actually really fascinating. Is that kind of how you…kind of went through this journey where you now study like the clash between nature and culture through art, but also biology?
Andrew 6:28
[laughs] Yeah, I mean, yeah. Wow, what a complex question! Y…I mean, yeah, I think so, yes and no, maybe? I teach insect anatomy, actually I know almost nothing about human anatomy. But my specialties, back in the day when I was trained as an evolutionary biologist, is, like, insect form. And I studied in a…in a lab that…hum…Professor’s speciality was actually understanding the evolution of butterfly wing patterns. And so I've always been really interested in this idea of, like, the evolution of form. And so that actually, to me, was very natural to think that, “oh, I study the evolution of…of visual and morphological form of the insect's”. But then, you know, the art sculpture design, that's also just fundamentally a questions of form. So I think about these things in a kind of philosophical way, that way, but um, and it's…it's interesting too, you know, one of the most popular classes I teach at the art school actually is called Insect World it is about…it's a field course about insects, we go collect them, they learn about insect anatomy, and a lot of my former students have turned out…then trans—, you know, going to the museum later to work, either as collection experts, or as scientific illustrators, or as people who do science communication. So there's this, you know, really, I think, through natural history, especially a tight and abiding connection to art and science. And so it's been really good for me here in Chicago to be able to also work with places like the Field Museum of Natural History, because I think there's more about understanding that these are very complementary fields that were once united.
Mimi 8:03
It's really cool that…that you're finding your students are…are exploring these other worlds outside of the art world and really enjoying it. Coming from our podcast, something that's really obvious to me is how both art and science are so intertwined with nature. So it's not just an art…art and science intertwining themselves, it’s nature being that common thread.
Andrew 8:23
Right.
Mimi 8:24
Yeah.
Andrew 8:24
Oh and that gets to Jordan's other question about the sort of clash between crea— nature and culture. It's funny, you mentioned that too. I was just looking back um…on this exhibition, I curated this last fall with my art historian colleague, Giovanni Aloi, called Earthly Observatory. And right now we're looking at the transcript of, like, a conversation we've had, and we're talking very much about how certain artists we had included in that exhibition was very much about trying to think about…with that question of intermingling, but also a clash, right, of sensibility. So there's an artwork by…that was in that exhibition, by this artist Mark Dion, where he goes to the Smart Museum of Art at University of Chicago, but he goes with a bunch of volunteers, and they look for all of the microorganisms they can find in the museum. Which of course, is like an anathema to the art museum. That's the very last thing they want anyone to look for, much less find, right? Because art is a cultural space. And creatures are a natural space, and never the two shall meet. So you know, Mark's work is so wonderful, because he's always trying to sort of critically and playfully ask these questions about these kinds of spaces and say, “Really? Is a cultural space really just cultural or can it be natural? Can my work as a cultural producer and artist be also natural history at the same time?” Yeah. So I think, you know, it's been really exciting working at this intersection, because I think the art is...you know, very traditionally has been seen as a very cultured space of the human, and of course, the world of science of the nonhuman. But of course, it's a continuum, that the extent to which we assume and assert that division is what's gotten us into a lot of the big problems we have right now. And so I think every effort has to be made to re— to, you know, reengage each— ourselves, to invite ourselves, to invite others to actually understand that relationship and that dependency.
Mimi 10:13
One of the things that I'm really curious about, with all of our guests, is how they understand their relationship with nature, cause I find that so fascinating the way humans understand how to navigate through the natural world. And with you, especially as both an artist and a scientist, and an educator, too! I, like, yeah, I'm curious about how your relationship with nature, like, first of all, what it is, and second of all, how it influences all of these different worlds that you're a part of. And not just the different worlds, but how these worlds intersect, and even clash?
Andrew 10:47
Yeah, that's, that's the million dollar question. And I think, you know, I'm— I myself am nature too, right? And…but then I'm not in other times and other circumstances, right? And so the thing about one's relationship, or understanding, to nature, or to culture, or otherwise, is that, you know, these things are always relational, and they're always contextual. And so…and again, that's really complex. So I think, my understanding of nature, again, is…is also context dependent. I mean, one thing I'll say, just as a preface is, you know, my childhood definitely had a major influence in the way I think about nature, and in the way I…which I also think I don't…I never had that tendency to think of nature and culture in opposition, or science and art and opposition. I mean, I was raised on a 70 acre farm, in kind of s…semi-rural Massachusetts, and both of my parents are scientists. But my father is a physician, but he also, you know, we had 18 heads of cattle, and 4 horses, and pigs, and…So I grew up in a place where I got to interact with all kinds of animals, all the time, but also in a household where people thought very analytically about things in another way. And so, I think my relationship to nature has always been premised on this notion of, like, intimacy, right, of actually having contact with the natural world, with organisms. And…and I really was very lucky to have that growing up. And then, so when I became older, and I start—moved to cities, like Chicago, that I…you know, there is extent to which I feel very alienated from my notions of nature, and that kind of intimacy or connection, because it's…it's much more mediated, it's much more limited, right? In different ways. And so a lot of the artworks that I do also grow out of that tension of me sort of…sometimes nostalgically, but I think also sometimes very, you know, heartfelt, and in the moment, needing more of that connection. And so that shows up in the kinds of the works I make. I mean, one…one I did…that I think about a lot in that regard, also, in terms of what we think about nature is even this piece I had done called A Beach (for Carl Sagan), for the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago. And it's…it's this sand dunes of the kind you would find. So I installed these land— sand dunes in, like, the art— the Museum of Contemporary Art, and they look like the kind you'd find on Lake Michigan. But I’m als—it's also playing off of this metaphor of the…of Carl Sagan that, you know, if we take one grain of sand as a star, then you know, all the grains of sand I can hold in my hand, are probably all the stars you can see in the night sky. In Chicago, I can see almost no…stars in the night sky. And uh…And I grew up with the sky being filled and suffused with them. I was readin— when my child was maybe three, my daughter, I was reading a book to her actually. And it was a collage book. And at…and at one moment in the book, a child's looking up. And there's…the collage has all these little white dots as the stars in the sky. And my daughter was like, “what, what's that? What are they pointing at?” And I'm like, “Well, what do you mean, honey, like, those are the stars in the sky”. And she's like, “the sky doesn't look like that!”, of course, being raised in Chicago, I realized she'd [laughs] have actually never seen this sky. And it's so deeply like uh…uuh…kind of almost hurt me to think that her relationship with nature, in that most fundamental way, that we're just one of among billions of planets and billions of stars, right, that she doesn't have that connection growing up in the city that I had. And so making that artwork that sort of represents the Milky Way, you can't see that 200 billion grains of sand as like these 200 billion stars, is kind of, again, trying to both recognize that, in maybe some sort of pseudo-poetic way but also, you know, there's some melancholy there [laughs] for…for what you don't have as a connection to nature. And so, a lot of the work is my own attempts, I think, personally, to regain some intimacy with the nature—connections to nature I don't feel like I necessarily have in the city otherwise, but also to sort of invite other people to think about those things too.
Jordan 14:50
It's funny when we when I was prepping for this interview, I thought about landscape photography, landscape art is one of my favorite go to when I'm in museums, when I'm taking photographs, like nature, like you said, like, there's something about capturing that intimacy, especially when you're the person…which was, which is why I love photography. Like it's— you're experiencing it, and you're trying to show the beauty of nature through it. But I realized, like, now when I go to art museums, or just museums in general, and I see landscape photography or I see, like nature in art— I can't, like it's now…I now don't just get the enjoyment from seeing it, I now am reminded about climate change. And I'm curious for you, throughout your, like, artistic journey up until now, has the way that you portrayed art— um, nature in your art changed as you learn more about the climate crisis?
Andrew 15:49
Yeah, I think definitely so. I think one other thing about landscape…I'll just say that I think it's interesting what you said about photography, you know, this is the picture you've seen, it represents sort of your point of view. And then, I think with landscape, what's really interesting is that question of control, right? Because, like, landscapes are something also that…like, how much of a landscape is something, you know? The…the photograph has this amazing ability to help you capture something just as you see it, but then that's assuming that you can actually capture it with the weather, and the clouds, and everything else. There's...there's all this uncertainty, I think landscapes, a really interesting place to think about, like, our tendency is to want to control the world, versus just like, let it be, and observe the world. So climate change, and the human induced climate change, and then human induced biodiversity loss…that's… that's definitely motivated a lot of my recent work. You know, there are a lot of installations that look at the question of, like, how landscapes have changed over time, both naturally and “unnaturally” through human forces. And that there's also works that really look at the relationships of us to other organisms, specifically in like urban settings. I know that you had seen that artwork called Flying Gardens of Maybe at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History. So that project, which is pretty long running, definitely engaged with some of those questions in regards to birds in the city. But not just birds, all of the plants that those birds carry in the form of seeds. And really trying to make visible some of those complexities of ecosystems and landscapes, right? Birds are agents of the landscape, they carry these seeds that they eat from the plants, and then, you know, they poop those seeds out, giving those plants a chance to migrate, and also create landscapes themselves. And so we don't think about it that way, but every time a bird is migrating, it's…it's an active agent of landscape change, or landscape maintenance. By creating our own landscapes that have really tall skyscraper buildings, and birds hitting them, we actually don't interrupt just the birds migration, we interrupt the migration of all the plants and therefore the possibilities of the way that the landscape might transform itself otherwise. So those projects were in ta— in that case, taking the seeds and growing them in pots so that you see the plants that otherwise would have grown, it's trying— and creating the sort of micro garden landscape, is trying to point all of those things to try to, like, re complexify, I think, what otherwise was, like, the way that we really homogenized landscapes otherwise. You know, sometimes I describe that Flying Gardens of Maybe project as ecologies of interruption, because you know…But you can't shut down that ecology, but you can intervene. And the question is, are we going to make our— what are the nature of our interventions, like, even if you don't want to control, you're still going to change and influence things. So people didn't mean to have hundreds of millions of birds die by hitting skyscrapers when they built them, but that's sort of an unintended consequence. And so that's… that's not a control. But…But well, we can control that we could build buildings differently, we could shut lights out at night, so that not only birds wouldn't hit buildings, but my daughter could see the night sky, or many other things, right? And so, you know, I think part of it is like trying to negotiate what is your relationship with this thing we call nature. And it isn't— we don't have control, and we never will, and the extent we assume that we do, we also, of course, self-serve promises to ourselves, and then disasters happen. And we're like, “Well, why couldn't we have controlled that”, but then we can nudge it. And it nudges us, you know, there's a reciprocity, we are part of nature. And I guess the question is, like, just in this push and pull, like, it's all temporary. And there's something also ephemeral about it.
Mimi 19:32
When I first asked you, what's your relationship with nature, the very first thing you said was “In some spaces, I am nature and in some spaces, I'm not”. And I thought that was a really, really interesting way to open up your…your sentence and I've never heard anyone say that before. I think when I'm trying to control things, whether it's nature, whether it's myself, whether it's…just like external factors that I really don't have any control over, I feel, like, almost…alien in my own body, like, it just doesn't feel right. But when I'm letting things happen, and when I'm going with the flow, and…you know, also using my agency, not saying like, “Oh, I'm just gonna let the world take me where it needs to take me”, like, taking calculated risks and trying to…influence positively where I can, that's when I feel like “okay, yeah, this feels a lot more natural”! So, yeah, it's just, it's interesting to…to wrap all of the things that you've said together, yeah, it's— yeah, it's just really cool! [laughs]
Andrew 20:30
[laughs] Yeah. And it's about being, you know, res— I think one thing I just thought of, as you were talking, Mimi, is that, you know, I think the difference in agency is that there's a sense of responsiveness. It isn't just that you are hatching your own plan, and…and the blueprint in your mind of how the way things should be, you update all of what you're doing, and how you're doing it, and why, the more you learn, right, at every moment. And so that responsiveness is really important.
Jordan 20:55
You had sent us one of…one of your own articles, where you talked about the possibility that artistic agency lies more in plants or nature, than with you as the artist?
Andrew 21:08
It’s like, you know, maybe this project wasn't my idea. It's the pro— it's in a sense, “the idea of the birds or the plants”. Like, why am I so compelled to do this project? Like, I could think of it in terms of my own artistic intention and creativity, and “oh, I'm going to do this very clever thing and…”. But, there's something else much more viscerally that's happening, like, why am I so interested in pursuing that? Like, there's something about the birds, and the plants, and the seeds that's compelling me and drawing me in to this practice, and maybe they're actually asserting their own kind of agency on me, and I'm actually the vehicle for plants and seeds to also help us reimagine another kind of relationship. [laughs] I know that sounds kind of hocus pocus-y to a lot of people, but, you know, I…I refer, I think, in my essay to this really great chapter Michael Pollan has in his book, The Botany of Desire, where he says, “Look, you know, plants…if plants would think of a strategy to, like, increase their reproduction on the planet, it would be to, like, be pretty”. And like, so he talks about roses, and apples, and all of these things, as actually maybe being the true agents of domestication. And they're sort of fulfilling their own desires through us. But of course, we tell ourselves the narrative story that it was our idea. And, you know, I think there is something to that, though, it's very important. Once you start thinking in systems, you think relationally. And when you start thinking relationally, you have to consider the possibility that “I'm not always the only agent, I'm not always the one making the first decision or…or the first gesture”. You know, after the fact we tell ourselves, “so it was, it was me, it was my thought, it was my idea”, but it could be, of course, if we are part of nature, that it's communicating to us also in very subtle ways. So I think it's important for artists and designers to also think about, like, “oh, maybe there are cues we're being given”. Like, I sometimes think, like, this project’s actually really about plants and birds trying to sort of, like, make visible their own plight in another kind of way. Like, with the same kind of intention I do as a human? No, but that doesn't mean it's not agency. You know, we have a very anthropocentric way of considering cause and effect. And as a scientist, I know that many notions of our cause-and-effect ideas are…are flatly wrong. That's the beauty of what science has helped us discover is like, our—all of our anthropocentric notions of how things happen, are…are usually incorrect. And…and it could be another case of that. [laughs] You know, one…one thing does make me think, I recently gave a talk at the Smithsonian about that project. And someone asked in a question in the chat that I couldn't get to, like, “How do you know if this project is successful?”. Like, “Is this project changing someone's mind?” And, you know, it's…it's humbling to think like, “yeah, I don't know!”, you know? Again, it's an art project, not a design project, but even if I was designed— I am des—, there are elements of design and…and the thing is, a lot of the gestures that we're going to make, we don't know the outcomes, or the outcomes aren't going to become apparent, for much, much longer. And I think that's a big challenge, for all of us thinking about climate change, or biodiversity loss, is like, we want to make sure what we're doing has an impact. But again, that's also like a symptom of control. Like, I think we should do our best to try to have to do things that are impactful, but we can't always see the fruits of that right of way. That short term thinking is the-business-as-usual thinking of short term profit, of short term expectations that again, has gotten us into…So if we were to slow down our expectations what would be different? Like the Flying Gardens of Maybe it's called that because, like, half of those seeds I plant don't sprout. [laughs] And some of those seeds I put into bird feeders, and the birds carry them on. Now, is that going to assure that a species of plant actually survives? You would say no, that's a pathetic— my…my artistic friend [inaudible] says like that's, that's the pathetic artistic gesture. So like, “Oh, this is so low impact! This isn't actually doing anything!”. But you know, like, evolution of life on the planet Earth is, like, a series of things that shouldn't have happened statistically, and yet they did. Like, everything that matters in the world…an asteroid hitting us 65 million years ago was a complete matter of like, one single chance operation. And everything—So many things are! So like, unfortunately, I think everything we do matters. We shouldn't put, you know, undue pressure on us. But I think that's where we can…gain a lot of our agency is to understand that, like, “actually, maybe that one little seed making it somewhere will save its species”. Like, “maybe that one mutation didn't make a difference, maybe that one…”, I guess, I guess some people call it the butterfly effect. [laughs] In evolution, we call that contingency, or we call that chance, but like everything on the world is, like, built on chance that's basically nudged one way or the other.
Mimi 25:52
One of the things that Jordan and I really talked about, when we were first starting this podcast, was this idea of perfectionism, and then imperfectionism, which is what we wanted to, like, amplify and promote to our listeners and our community. But kind of what you're saying in…in that answer is that if you're not obsessed with production, and results, and impact in that anthropocentric way that we've all been taught, you kind of…not necessarily reduce the amount of pressure that's on you, but you're more…more susceptible to just like, being okay with wha—whatever results you see, and whatever results you don't see. Because you…you may not see all of the results, right?
Andrew 26:29
Yeah!
Mimi 26:29
So I’m…I'm just wondering if the way you understand that relationship with knowledge and…and nature, if that takes away the pressure of being a perfectionist, for you. If you…if you suffered at all from perfectionism, but I think as you ment—you’ve had to, yeah?
Andrew 26:46
Oh yeah! Sure, sure. Yeah, yeah! Yeah, I mean, it's really hard, right? I mean, I think it's not…there's still the…there's still the…the goblin of perfectionism in terms of like, “Well, did I do the best I could do? I know I can't do it perfectly, but did I do it to its utmost?” Cause…cause I think, like, if you're a perfectionist, you understand too that it isn't just, like, how well you did it, but like, when you did it, you're like, “oh, did I just do that the right time. and…” But again, like that can— you have to have some humility about that. I mean, for better for worse, like, as a teacher, it's been interesting, because there's cert— certain students I had who, at the time they're taking my class, hated it. Like, you could tell they hated the class, [laughs] or they disliked me, or something. They wrote a really bad review of my class. And then some of them, I’ve—you know, have come back like two years later and said, “You know, I really disliked your class, but now, it's been so meaningful to me. [laughs] Like, it's one of the best classes I ever took, it just took me six years to figure that out”. And you're like, “Wow, uh… thanks! Like that would have been ni—”. I mean, it's both great and horrible cause you're like, “Oh, my life was miserable, then”. And so, sometimes, maybe it's like— that's one way to, I guess, you know… Anyway, so it's hard not to still be a perfectionist. I think...I just want to say I love the t—…one thing that I really…when I first heard about your podcast, that I loved about, was the title Imperfect Eco-Hero. Cause I think you also, like, laid out the contradiction the hero is the…is um…I mean, depending on what… what narrative tradition you're in, I mean, heroes are often flawed, but the idea of the heroic is like…seems to be aiming towards perfection. And this idea that you're, like, acknowledging the imperfection, I think, is so important, because it's like…we are, we're just doing our very best, or we…we should do our very best, but we also have to just at some point, you know, give up some control. Because I think th—that control can also make us then continue to meddle too much in certain things, like… So that's…I think that's the thing with geoengineering, we want to perfect, you know, we have this 1.5 degrees centigrade envelope that we want to live in, and that our civilizations evolved in. But even…But if, you know…that— it's not going to last foreth— forever, either way, like…So if we're not changing climate, now through geoengineering, when another ice age comes, we're going to try to change it some other fashion. And so it's like, we have these imperfect intentions, we have an imperfect understanding, and we're always updating them. So yeah, I don't know. I mean, I… I'll just say like, I think what's interesting about being an artist or an educator in general, and I'm sure for you guys as creative podcasters is like, you're making mistakes all the time. And so it's just a matter of learning from them and trying to do better. It's like, what's the phrase I recently learned…you know, they say “practice makes perfect”. Recently, someone introduced me to the idea that practice makes progress. And I'm like, “oh, I like that a lot better, you know, like”, you know…There is no perfect cause nothing static. I think that's the other thing just to mention, when…if you're going to talk about ecology or climate or anything, there's nothing that’s static. Like, we don't live in a perfect harmonious world and there's no optimum and I…I think that we have to embrace that messiness.
Jordan 30:02
I know for us, I think what often helps us with the whole imperfection piece is that we're not, either episodes, we're never trying to solve something. We're never trying to provide people with an answer to a burning problem. Do you think art in general should provide answers? And then…Like, what is the goal in your art, just in general?
Andrew 30:25
Yeah, I mean, there's many goals. I think the thing is, like, every given piece, or project…that has multiple layers to it. And so, I do, I am designing certain things about the project that will be legible, and I think, easy to understand if you spend a minute with it, and don't read the title. But oh, if you read the title, then oh, now you're understanding something slightly different. Oh, if you read the materials, then you're like, “oh, wait a second, this is about something else altogether”. And then you know, so each project, there is the intention that actually it's a bit of a…hopefully, it's complex, and that different people will get different kinds of things out of it, depending on how much time they spend, or what kind of thought they give to it, and that hopefully, there's even something that I get out of it. Like later, there's a…there's a project that I did a couple of years ago, someone was asking me about it, and I was explaining it. And then all of a sudden, I realized something, like, profoundly different about the artwork, then I'm like, “oh, you know what? I was actually…I think I was actually really concerned with this whole issue, and I didn't even realize it. Like, I was subconsciously working through this whole other issue, and five years later, I'm talking to you about it, and I finally understand what this artwork was about. It was about all of these things. But it was about this whole other thing too, motivating me that now, like… in talking about it, it's, you know, it's almost like psychotherapy, you… it's revealed to you, but…” [laughs]. So it does, it has, like, many—so I'll just say this, like, I think artwork should have many intentions, and many possible messages, but you can't assume, and you shouldn't try to control what all of them are. And I'm really happy when people come to me later about something they've seen in the museum and they are like, “oh, you know, this is what I thought and I learned something very revelatory…”, because the artwork isn't supposed to be an answer. Yeah, it's supposed to be a catalyst, it's supposed to create an opportunity to reconsider things, rather than just say any particular thing. So if I want to say a particular thing, you know, I can be a politician, um or…but if I want to invite questions for myself and other people, then I can make an artwork that's complex, that's contradictory, that isn't fully resolved.
Jordan 32:30
Do you find you spend just as much time devoting, like, to…like, your art asking a question as much as, for example, giving a title and the description? So, I can say, personally—
Andrew 32:41
Yeah.
Jordan 32:42
—when I saw your work in the Smithsonian—which is how we even found you in the first place—like, the first thing that got me was the title. [Andrew hums] I found the title, even before I saw it, I was already thinking and like, it was already thought provoking. What does Flying Gardens of Maybe even mean? Like, it's like, it was such an interesting title. And then I obviously looked at the piece, and that also engaged different feelings to the listeners. In the art piece that I saw, there were mirrors as well, and so you often saw yourself reflected back, which was interesting, because it—I first thought it was to represent the…the glass that birds would crash into—
Andrew 33:28
Yeah, fly into!
Jordan 33:28
—but then all of a sudden you see yourself too, and you're just like, “okay, but am I..am I also to blame?”. Like, it almost felt like it was implicating the viewer. And then I read your description of it, and then it added, like, all these layers, like is that—
Andrew 33:42
I definitely pay a lot of attention to the titles and a lot of attention to all, even though I know that 80% of the people will look at it and never read the title. But for someone like you who does, then great that…that opens up another possibility. You know, so you're just creating encounters, you're just creating situations of encounter in an artwork and those situa— or podcast or anywhere, anything, you're setting up a situation of encounter. And that encounter has possibilities, and you're just trying to set up as many different possibilities as possible in a way, [laughs] right?
Jordan 34:14
How do you handle when people discourage or close the door on ideas with your art? What—how do…one, how does that make you feel? And like two, like, ho—what do you…what do you do about it?
Andrew 34:27
Yeah, I try not to take it personally. I mean, it's hard not to feel rejection sometimes. But I think often it has to do not with me, but with other people's, like, professional roles and other things. So, you know, I just move on to the next door. And if there is no other door, then I put that idea on ice, until the possibility of it might be, you know… have some traction somewhere else. So there's a lot of ideas for projects I have that I've had to, like, put on ice because they're, you know, there just weren't receptive collaborators. And so I c...I bide my time a little bit and wait till…or I think of another approach. And so, you know, sometimes… I was doing a project actually about plastics in…the history of plastics and plastic manufacturing and pollution in Massachusetts. And so…
Jordan 35:14
Waste Not, Want Not! Or…no…
Andrew 35:16
Waste Not, Want Not, yes. [laughs]
Jordan 35:18
Yeah, I…I remember then telling you, your titles [Andrew laughs], they really stick with me, it was great!
Andrew 35:22
Yeah, yeah. And so, part of that, for me, was to actually like, “well, I want to learn about plastic manufacturing”. I grown up near a town that was famous for it, the head invent—the pink flamingo, lawn flamingo, who had been invented there. [laughs] If you can believe it, that's its name to fame. So I literally just went— I would drive up to plastics factories and knock on the door, and…and try to engage people in conversation. And sometimes…like, literally, the—one person was very angry and aggressive, and he…he thought that I was trying to steal some sort of trade secret. Another person was like, it was clear that maybe it… Yeah, and in other cases, they…they were…I had to then just knock on the next door, then I would…I would knock on the door and they…they shut the door on me like “you're not in a plastics industry…professional, I'm not going to talk to you”. So then I would call them up later, being kind of a different person asking a different kind of question. And then they would say, “okay, sure, you can come, like, if you want to interview me, that's fine”. So I sometimes will just take different approaches. But I literally, that day, knocked on like three different doors of plastics factories, and one finally let me in. And like “sure, hey, can—”...They want to show like their whole photo book of the history of their factory, and I just had coffee with them and hung out for three hours, you know, just to get to know people. So…Cause they're excited, they were excited. They wanted to share that with me, and the other people didn't and that's fine. Like, I don't take any of that personally. So...
Jordan 36:57
What I loved about your answer was, yeah, you…you realized that it's not that…that people don't want to help, and it's not that people don't want to share their stories, it's just we have to go about it in a way that will make sense to them.
Andrew 37:10
To them, yeah!
Jordan 37:10
And that they feel safe. Yeah. And that they feel safe and comfortable to want to share it with you. And like you said, the moment you did that—
Andrew 37:15
And, and respected.
Jordan 37:17
Yeah, exactly.
Andrew 37:18
Yeah, you know.
Jordan 37:18
And then, that you had coffee with you! It was great.
Andrew 37:20
Yeah. Yeah. But it's hard. Because it's like you do want something, and so how— it…it also it's like…you have to check yourself, you're like, “Oh, am I just being extractive? They have something I want and I want t—or do I want to, at least, have some kind of relationship of, like, mutual respect to that? Even if we're strangers.” Like, how do you do that? Even if it's a very brief or ephemeral thing, there are ways to do that, you know, without—but it's hard, because it's like, you have an idea, you want something from someth—, some situation, it's hard not to be extractive, and to slow yourself down, and sort of reframe. So it's like, it's often not the what, but the how. But the how is also your own sensibility. It isn't just like, “oh, okay, I'll knock on the other door, I'll knock on the other door or…brick through the window”. That would be like the dark side of getting what you want. But I think what, what—then there's this other approach of like, just “oh, I have to reframe how I'm even thinking about this”. For you, has that happened as you've approached different people for Imperfect Eco-Hero, different kinds of guests, or different kinds of questions that you want to tackle, and you had to sort of like, find another way? Or...
Jordan 38:28
I would say it's definitely happened in the sense—like, as two, you know, white, cis-women, the whole goal of our podcast is to have other peop—have people share their stories and give a spotlight to people and stories that aren't normally given a spotlight in, you know, the climate movement. And often, what I found…is hard sometimes is that, you know, there are people that I admire, and there are people that I think would be fascinating, and I'll reach out, and a lot of times I hear nothing back. And then the people that we do hear back from often tend to be other white, cis or other privileged—
Andrew 39:06
Right.
Jordan 39:07
—people. And so, something that we just recently talked about—me, Mimi and our transcriber Alex—was like, how do we bring in other diverse voices onto the podcast this year, [Andrew hums] but not, like you said, be extractive? [Andrew hums]
Mimi 39:23
Yeah. How do we…how do we build that trust, right? Like...
Andrew 39:25
Yeah.
Mimi 39:26
I think, for us—Jordan, and I, and Alex—we know that this is a safe space, and we know that our intention isn't to hurt anyone. But we kn—we know that there's other systems at play, right? And we know that, you know, the environmental world in general hasn't always been —and still isn't— inclusive, right? So how do we…
Andrew 39:45
Right. That’s right.
Mimi 39:46
How do we build that trust? Right, and that—there's no easy answer to that. That's just something that we're navigating, and…and also, we don't want to cross the line into tokenism either. Right? So…
Andrew 39:57
Right, yeah, that’s right.
Mimi 39:59
Yeah.
Andrew 39:59
Yeah. Yeah, and it's very hard. It's…it's…it’s a really important challenge to try to navigate. And in…as in curating these exhibitions, and also making sure there are diverse points of view, and perspectives in the artists that, you know, we exhibited, but also even the different panels and other events we had, yeah, you're always really trying to be respectful and aware of, like, all of the different kinds of dynamics at play, right? And, and how that…how that affects the way people respond or don't, right? And, and just, it's just going to be…it's a really long and complex process, we're in such a messy space that way, in terms of all of these different vine, priorities and, and levels of sort of, like, mistrust, and yeah, worrying about tokenism. That's something, you know, in checking one's own privilege in that regard, too, and also, like, having good intentions, but really bad execution. And…[laughs] or vice versa, you know?
Mimi 40:58
Yeah. Cause you talked about earlier…you were talking about the impact, and we were kind of seeing that in a positive way, but impact can also be incredibly harmful too, right? So…
Andrew 41:05
Yeah, that's right.
Mimi 41:06
Yeah.
Andrew 41:06
Yeah! Yeah. And often, that's where intention, you know, your best intentions…like, what's that phrase? Of course, “the road to hell is paved with good intentions”. But there's this idea that yeah, you know, you really have to be careful what you're asking for, and why, and that's just a constant negotiation with yourself, and…and, like, your own intentions, and what you're trying to achieve. It's always such a moving target. It gets back to ar—gets back to art, because, you know, there's that idea that it's really the artist's intention that matters. And…but you know…And I still don’t think that that's true. But it's…it doesn't matter completely and solely. Like, impact matters. Like, if you're misread, then you have some respons—you might have some responsibility [laughs] for that “misreading” and like, what does it mean for your words to be taken in a certain way? It's such a… a really complex thing to navigate.
Jordan 42:01
Have you ever found, in any of your older art pieces, or maybe some of the classes that you first taught like—did you now looking back, I think maybe your execution of the art or maybe your intention with the art...not was misguided, but maybe didn't quite have the impact that you were hoping for, like, now retrospectively, not…not at the time?
Andrew 42:21
Right, right. Yeah, you know, definitely, I'm sure of it in terms of the…art, but it's…I'm having to think about when that comes to mind…[laughs] Certainly, as a teacher, oh my gosh, so many times, so many failures and regrets about like, oh, you know, having misjudged or misunderstood, you know, how something could be taken, right? And I think it's even complex, like, you know, it's also…a lot of that is also generational, too. You know, there's certain ways you might think, or assume things and certain kinds of values that can't be assumed with people who, you know, grew up in a really different way.
Jordan 43:03
As an educator, you know, one of your biggest fears is overstepping. But do you like the fact that in art, you know, art doesn't need to be perfect?
Andrew 43:12
Right, no, I will s—that's true. Yeah, for sure. Like, I do feel like it's a much freer space than research science. Like, I feel like…you know, it's interesting because I can say to— it's…if you have been a research scientist, you understand that, like, 85% of your effort is failure. Like, if you're doing [laughs] experiments, like, it's built into it. Most of your effort goes into things that are not successful. But, the thing about science is, like, you really hide all of that, you never show the negative results, you’re…The culture of research science, now, I think it's one that, like, strives for a kind of perfection. And like, we should have journals filled with negative results, but we don't publish them because they're not sexy, they don't get you promoted, they don't get you a grant. But like, strictly speaking, the negative result is just as valuable as the positive result. And yet, this culture of science as it is, does wants to deny that it's almost like, you might as well be a celebrity, making sure your makeup looks perfect, whereas I think in this space of art, there is a lot more liberty, or freedom to, you know, to…to be imperfect and to…and for me to not be an expert. I mean, I'm an expert on, like, actually, insects and insect evolution biology. Very few of my projects are about that at all, because, like, I know too much about it. I'd rather actually sort of be an amateur in geology or in ornithology, or…I know nothing, next to nothing about plants, frankly, for a scientist. And…and I…So it's great, like, it's…gives me the freedom to, like, learn about things that I have no…that…to be naive, right? Unabashedly naive, and not have to be the expert and…and hold myself or other people to hold myself to that standard. And I can just be like this sort of ignorant person—not to say, and again, that ignorant has a negative connotation, but maybe the amateur. My…my friend, or my artist colleague, Claire Pentecost, her website’s called Public Amateur. And, she talks about the importance of the artist as an amateur, who can, like, approach things from a place of…that's lacking expertise, but has a lot of consideration and curiosity, right? And earnestness. But that you have a certain advantage in approaching something as an amateur that you don't as an expert. And I think art definitely allows for that kind of inquiry in a way that unfortunately, certain par—other parts of our soc—, you know, culture don't. You know, where you have to be perfect all the way through, and errors are not to be shared.
Mimi 45:35
I really like that, cause in…uh…previous guest Sarah, one of the things that she really owned was this idea of, like, reclaiming hypocrisy. Like, be a hypocrite and, like, call yourself out when you’re a hypocrite, and it’s totally okay, and you can still be this, like, “eco-hero”. And what you’re saying here is, reclaim ignorance or reclaim naivete, right? Like…
Andrew 45:56
Yeah.
Mimi 45:56
If that’s you, that's okay you don’t have to be an expert to have an impact.
Andrew 46:01
Yeah, or to have an…like there are issues of course with expertise and false expertise—
Mimi 46:07
Yes.
Andrew 46:07
—and of course like science denialism and whatever else, but…but there is something to it. I think that the key is that ignorance or naivete, is that a kind of like…With that chip on your shoulder are you open to…like, are you open to yourself being wrong? [Mimi hums] Is it just like, well… you know so there’s different kinds of attitudes towards having an opinion or being ignorant or whatever, and I think it’s just like…
Mimi 46:30
Yeah…yeah but they’re not necessarily bad things, right?
Andrew 46:34
No! Not at all!
Mimi 46:35
Yeah, it’s how you navigate your ignorance.
Andrew 46:37
And it’s terrifying, you know? It must be terrifying to..I mean it’s just you put yourself out there and you try these things. But again, and also respecting when people can’t do that and they don’t have the bandwidth to, putting yourself in hazard's way [background shuffling noise]. Having that bandwidth is a privilege, you know? Enough things in my life are easy enough that I can take those other kinds of risks. Other people don’t have that bandwidth because they have a lot of other things to deal with. And so, you know, I respect that, so. And that’s where it’s like, what it…does it mean to be heroic? You know, people who are heroes are often doing things you can’t even recognize the heroism of, because, like, you don’t understand the full context, you don’t understand just how much it takes out of them or, you know, how much impact it has, you know? So many of these things are invisible to us.
[outro]
Mimi 47:23
Thanks for listening to this episode of Imperfect Eco-Hero. Stay connected with us through our instagram @Imperfect_ecohero or email us at imperfectecohero@gmail.com. If you want to learn more about our podcast or see resources related to this episode, visit our website imperfectecohero.com.
