Since the 1990s, a diverse range of artistic productions – including individual artworks, installations, curated exhibitions, and collective artistic activism – have formed side programs of and interventions at the United Nations summits on the environment and climate. This seminar session consists, firstly, of a talk on artist-led tree plantings in the context of international summitry and, secondly, a close reading of an early “climate summit art” exhibition. On this basis, we will discuss artistic responses to environmental problems and climate politics in order to reflect on their characteristics and ambivalence with regards to their aesthetic and curatorial concepts, their underlying political assumptions, their form, and their particular political, social and economic contexts. These events focus on the “ceremonial” and the “celebratory” and their concealment of historical and social contradictions in the cultural-environmentalist field constitutes one of the main topics of the seminar. This cultural tendency will be further explored through the essay “Masters of the Arctic: Social, Eco-Political and Economic Dimensions of a Touring ‘Inuit Art’ Exhibition, 1989–1997” [in print]. Parsing the commodification of “Inuit culture” and “the Arctic” in conjunction with ideological conceptions of “nature” in relation to tradition, ethnicity, and spirituality, the analysis further seeks to illuminate the broader contexts of international eco-political negotiations and invites critical reflection on the functionalization of art and culture within ecological debates. 

Linn Burchert is head of the research group, “Art, Environment, Ecology” at the Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte (Central Institute for Art History) in Munich. Since completing her dissertation, her research has focused upon ecological thought during modernity, image theories, and modern painting. Her second book project, funded by the German Research Council (DFG), is dedicated to the analysis of “Climate Summit Art,” and investigates aspects of “performativity,” “culturalism,” and the complex aporias that surround the notion of “art as politics.” Her broader interests lie in the ambivalence of modern and contemporary political art and ideology critique. 

Registration: The seminar is open to an interested public. To take part, please register by sending an e-mail to fsolte@dfk-paris.org. Please prepare by reading the following text that will be sent to you after registration:
Linn Burchert, “Masters of the Arctic. Social, Eco-Political and Economic Dimensions of a Touring ‘Inuit Art’ Exhibition, 1989–1997,” Regine Ehleiter/Friederike Schäfer (eds.), Exhibition Ecologies: Art, Institutions, and the Politics of Ecological Crisis, Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter *2026, tba. [in print].

The event is part of the bi-annual theme “Nature” of DFK Paris, directed by Peter Geimer and Pierre Wat.