Solastalgia: Book Art and the Climate Crisis / MCBA 2021
Rhiannon Alpers
Exhibition Dates: June 11–October 17, 2021
Held at: MCBA Main Gallery, Minneapolis MN
Solastalgia: Book Art and the Climate Crisis, curated by Director of Exhibitions & Artist Programs Torey Erin, features expansive and experimental works by twenty local, national, and international artists addressing the paradoxical nature of grief, despair, beauty, elegy, regeneration, and loss that we are facing as we confront one of the most defining issues of our time.
This exhibition is produced in partnership with EXTRACTION: Art on the Edge of the Abyss. De-centered, nonhierarchical, and self-organizing, EXTRACTION includes projects by hundreds of artists and cultural institutions in multiple locations throughout the U.S. and abroad during the summer of 2021. Through simultaneous and overlapping exhibitions, installations, performances, land art, publications, and cross-media events, EXTRACTION addresses a single theme: the suicidal consumption of the planet’s natural resources.
The artistic vision for Solastalgia: Book Art and the Climate Crisis is grounded in solastalgia, a term coined by environmental philosopher Glenn Albrecht to better describe the psychological toll of climate change. Solastalgia is the pain caused by recognition that the place where one resides and that one loves is under immediate assault—the lived experience of environmental change and a form of homesickness one gets when one is still at home. From traditional codices to pop-up books to sculptural vessels made of bacteria cultures, this exhibition is both a call to alarm and a symbol of hope that through compassion and ingenuity, it is possible to imagine new futures.