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INTRODUCTION
This essay discusses the reasons why the arts—particularly the
live, participatory, bodybased arts—must be restored to their central
role in community life if we are to achieve the goal of sustainable living.
I am addressing the many people all over the globe who are working so
hard to design and implement ecovillages, cohousing communities, permaculture
homesteads and sustainable living projects with the hope of opening a
much-needed dialogue about what role the arts must play in these communities
and why. I am also addressing the many artists out there who seek to direct
their art towards social and ecological health.
Here I can only begin to touch upon a subject which is largely absent
in literature on sustainability and permaculture. For example, Bill Mollison’s
now classic text, Permaculture: A Designer’s Manual, whom
many (myself included) consider to be a permaculture “bible”
of sorts, hardly even mentions the word “art.” This nearly
six-hundred page text is devoted to the laws and principles of good, sustainable
design, including pattern understanding, settlement design—even
diversity, alternative economic models, and right livelihood, but includes
nothing on how we must design to reincorporate the arts into these settlements.
I do not intend this statement as a criticism of Mollison, whose contribution
to the cause of sustainability (which is in itself an art form) cannot
be overestimated. Rather, I mean to draw some attention to what may be
a “blind spot” in the permaculture and environmental movements
in general.
I strongly believe that any attempts to build a new paradigm for sustainable
human communities will be unsuccessful unless the arts are restored to
a central role in that paradigm. We may have remarkable technical prowess
in eco-building design, beneficial plant guilds, and alternative energy
systems, but if we do not consistently utilize the arts to heal our decimated
social infrastructure and to engage our whole selves, this prowess will
be insufficient. This is not to say that technical or scientific knowledge
is unimportant. Rather, the time has come to recognize that the knowledge
gained in practicing more intuitive arts is just as essential as rational
scientific knowledge. Indeed, scientific knowledge cannot be whole unless
it is balanced by the arts.
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