On "The Entanglement of Art and Sustainability"

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ART AND SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT – A CONDITION Art and its radical-essential role in the transition of the world to Sustainability by Alfred W. Strigl

Old times come to an end We live in exciting times. Storms are raging outside. Also inside of us. The world is haunted by one shock wave after another: economic crises, environmental crises, state crises, financial crises, famines. It seems that what no longer should be on earth, swells, for one last time to full bloom, before it has to go. At the same time many people feel that what wants to come is now making its way. The old braces itself, groaning against it. Why at all? For how much longer? We live in times of change. Transformations are happening in and around us so fast, so profoundly, so dramatically like never felt in the past millenia. Tension fields between the notanymore and the not-yet are opening up with a noise. We no longer live in the bipolar world characterized by the power struggle between communism and capitalism. And not yet in a post-capitalistic post-growth economy geared towards sustainability. Science calls this tense moment between the not-anymore and the not-yet: ambiguity. For her, nobody stays unnoticed. From ambiguity no one can hide. We all are exposed to her. It’s time for a profound change – in fact this change is already happening. The brave dare their own, holy adventure, dare to start with the other, the new, in order to create already today what bears the possibility to be created in the future. The timid cling cramped, mendaciously nostalgic, waiting and hoping. In standing still they often try to save what is no longer to be saved – the old. And forget the essential that is the only thing worth keeping. But all – the bold just like the anxious – carry in their hearts the longing for the comfort in a certain today that bears in itself a good life and a good tomorrow.

What provides support in such times? What gives us courage, what gives us home? The broad outlines are the ones we have set out for: human dignity, mindfulness, confidence, love, social cohesion. Fate puts trifles in the way for us daily. These we cannot determine, and we should not anyway. We are here for the great whole, for the valuable, the capable, that set humans upright, that creates a human humanity. We would lose ourselves in everyday tasks and lose ourselves completely, would not there be the knowledge about my meaningful contribution, my mind-fulfillment for the whole. It is about the valuable whole. That is why we have come. That is why we will go again. New times dare to start Who among us is close to these great outlines, to these images and the substantial, I ask? Who among us dares to remember them, dares to compete with them? I know the answer. The artists are the ones. They dare the impossible, fight for the unattainable, put their hands into the infinite to bring colors, sounds, images, miracles out of it for us. For the Arts everything stands open - all in wonder. But what kind of wonders do we need? What is able to turn around distress? What miracles does the »sustainability« need that we want so much to bring to life? Miracles come true when the supernatural breaks through Nature from above and below, from the outside and the inside. Miracles come true when the magical, the transcendental enters the world of reality, when the substantial joins the necessary in a shining, enlightening and healing way, when the substantial keeps lightening us up until we are bright and awake.


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