Rooted in Soil

Fatemi Laura, Fatemi Farrah, Heneghan Liam

Eco and environmental art can highlight the primal importance of natural resources for human life and the need to be responsible environmental stewards. This catalog for a recent exhibition at the DePaul Art Museum explores one particularly undervalued resource: soil. Bringing together the work of fifteen artists, including that of photographers Sally Mann and Jane Fulton Alt, interdisciplinary artist Claire Pentecost, and Baroque painter Adriaen van Utrecht, "Rooted in Soil" addresses critical issues of soil degradation and combines scientific approaches with fresh philosophical perspectives. Though we rarely recognize it, soil is an integral part of the natural cycles of life and death. The essays here include scholarly meditations on the importance of decay for soil, which allows for rebirth and regeneration. The works in the Rooted in Soil exhibition collectively highlight the fundamental interconnectedness that we have with the natural world and inspire viewers to become better stewards of the soil and the land.

About the Author

Laura Fatemi is interim director of the DePaul Art Museum in Chicago.

Farrah Fatemi is assistant professor of environmental science at St. Michael's College in Colchester, Vermont.

Liam Heneghan is professor and chair of the Environmental Science and Studies Department at DePaul University in Chicago.

Reviews

"A wise and timely group show... The loamy dew of these organic artworks swamps the air and renders the experience of 'Rooted in Soil' visceral... The exhibition also includes representational work and designed objects, the best of which confront death and decay with a lack of sentimentality and a surfeit of bravery" – Chicago Tribune, on the exhibition

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