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Systems, Pedagogies and Practices for Learning on a Damaged Planet: A proposal for the symbiogenesis of art and education towards interdisciplinary, integrative and critical ecopedagogies

Hakemuksen tiivistelmä

What does an endosymbiotic partnership between Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) and art institutions look like? How could it work? Could methodologies and tools developed within artistic and social collaborative contexts be used to create holistic and ecocentric education models? 'Learning on a Damaged Planet' embarks from ESD's problematic aspects and responds to an identified need to rethink ESD's priorities and methodologies. It hypothesises that the emergent property arising from a prolonged encounter between art and culture and ESD can catalyse: the key competencies for sustainable development, a shift towards interdisciplinary, integrative and critical ecopedagogies, and address inherent inconsistencies within the art sector between their content and practices. It will demonstrate that artistic practices can be vital for developing holistic ecopedagogies and that art institutions can become hosts and caretakers for life-long learning. In exchange, in-house energy and sustainability experts could assist institutions in transitioning to eco-conscious practices in times of ecological collapse. The aim is to demonstrate that synergies arising from a life-long partnership between environmental education and art can positively impact both sectors and have ripple effects across their respective ecosocial spheres. The research will be carried out in Finland, Sweden, Cyprus and Italy and will provide insight into how different cultural contexts are engaging with, or not, ecolieracy and ecopedagogies within their respective art institutions. Based on the knowledge acquired, it will propose a practical framework how ESD can be integrated into the lifeline of art institutions and will contribute to the current understanding and efforts of rethinking institutions and their role in society and aspires to be a too for policy-makers and starting-point, a guide, and a recipe for educators and cultural workers alike.

This research employed a mixed-method approach to inquire why and how ecopedagogy may respond to the shortcomings of shallow environmental education and whether it can co-evolve within art institutions symbiotically. Within the framework of my concurrent studies in ‘Education for Sustainable Development’ and ‘Symbiotic Organisations’ I ran a seven-month long intercommunal and transdisciplinary empirical study which offered unique insights into the potential and challenges of ecopedagogies through collective artistic practices in Cyprus. The methodological, conceptual and theoretical frameworks that were developed for my thesis are grounded in post-qualitative, posthumanist and decolonial approaches in response to identified limitations of pedagogical approaches in ESD. During ‘Deconstruct & Rebuild’, a program initiated by BJCEM (2022-24) I served as a member of the scientific committee. I organised and led two online courses, two conferences and two questionnaires addressed altogether to seven hundred cultural workers, incl. directors, policy-makers and institutions across Western Europe and the Mediterranean. This project allowed me to experiment with and apply my exploratory research, in addition to grounding it via qualitative methodologies on how, if, and for whom ecopedagogies can be cultivated within art institutions. Over time, the research inevitably expanded beyond big institutions to learn from small and middle-sized art institutions and case studies where informal education, programming, and priorities are more attuned to the escalating socio-ecological crises. I also visited and/or volunteered in places that enriched my studies, including: animal sanctuaries, food co-ops, ecosystem regeneration initiatives, climate activism, social centres, artists’ associations and permaculture farms. The research is gradually being published on the platform’s website learninginbecoming.org, and will culminate to an open-access e-pub in late 2026.

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