ELINE DE CLERCQ: November 2023

An introduction to the poster as an artistic contribution.

The Sympoiesis Garden

On gardening together as an artistic practice

The edition of Fall 2023 Forum+ holds a poster between her pages, it is a map into the The Sympoiesis Garden, the artistic research project on starting up a community garden in the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp. We have made this poster together: Maren Rommerskirchen, Kristina Fekete, Lotte De Voeght and me Eline De Clercq for this edition of Forum+ on the art school as an ecosystem. The poster captures a moment in the making off this garden by more than human species who all play a role in the ecosystem of the Academy. The Sympoiesis Garden is a project in the care of the research group Art & Ecology, and the ideas and methodology fit within the mycelium of an old and new network by artists who engage with nature. This poster is a map into the garden, a path into the research, a string figure in gardening and a S.F. for artistic practices we’re happy to share with the readers of Forum+.

Introduction

In September 2022, Eline De Clercq started a community garden together with students and artists at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp. The Sympoiesis Garden is a three-year artistic research project on art and ecology and functions as a non-formal learning environment about climate change, gender norms, decolonisation and intersectionalism. The text for the poster is written similar to a garden, with patches of words and a path for the reader to enter the project.  

Keywords: art and ecology, community garden, climate change, intersectional practices  

Personalia/bio

Eline De Clercq (she / her) is a visual artist working at the intersection of gender, lesbian identity and ecology. Eline uses gardening as part of a wide artistic practice. In the Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp she initiated the artistic research The Sympoiesis Garden.

Format: B2 (500 x 707 mm), folded into B5

Made possible by Track Report

The Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp presents Ecosystems, an exhibition on ecology and art. 20 October - 9 November 2023

With the exhibition ‘Ecosystems. Science – Art – Activism’ at the Lange Zaal, we bring historical and contemporary 'eco-art' into the school walls, not only as a source of inspiration, but also as food for critical thought, and as a stimulus for future artistic practices. We present printed matter from the Earth-, Land- and Eco-Art Era of the 1960s-1980s, as well as environmental work of Patricia Johanson, one of the first female artists making in situ works based on science and ecology. Further in the exhibition the ‘Portable Orchard’ by the eco-art pioneers The Harrisons is brought to life again in collabortation with students. We also look to the contemporary artistic research field at our Academy. Works of the artists Tim Theo Deceuninck, Mirja Busch, Jarek Lustych, Sascha Herrmann, Dries Segers, Eline De Clercq, Saskia Van der Gucht, Kristof Timmerman, Peter Lemmens and Jeroen Cluckers are on show. (Text by Roel Arekesteijn, ARTICULATE, 2023)

set up of the String Figure Patch within the exhibition Ecosystems

Garden Table, String Figure Patch, Artists publication

Eline De Clercq & Saskia Van der Gucht, a collaboration in artistic researches.

During ARTICULATE, the garden community of the Academy will have a garden table set up in the exhibition in the Lange Zaal. In 2022, Eline De Clercq started a community garden in the Academy’s old garden, where weekly sessions are organised with students and artists. This artistic research project on art and ecology functions as an informal learning environment about climate change, gender norms, decolonisation and intersectionalism.

On the garden table you will find working texts, books, seeds, tools and more: a gathering of objects and ideas on what it means to work with nature within an artistic practice. On a small side table is the artist edition poster about last year's research 'The Sympoiesis Garden' printed with Track Report: a map of the start of this garden project with patches of words and a path for the reader to follow.

On the floor in the middle of a string figure patch is a presentation of the work On Sand, three ceramic biotope dishes were made during a collaborative research project with Saskia Van der Gucht (researcher at Sint Lucas Antwerpen) and Eline De Clercq. These containers holds sand carried by the wind to Antwerp more than 10,000 years ago, during the most recent glacial time. With the help of archaeologists, the artists were able to retrieve this sand from the dig site in Antwerp’s Leftbank area, right at the heart of the PFAS pollution, buried under layers of land and history. The material holds aspects of care, habitation, touch and invisibility. In the clay receptacle the sand is once again given the opportunity to become a habitat for plants and animals. It’s not a reconstruction of the original fauna and flora, it’s a curiosity-fuelled ‘what if’ situation: the artists want to look after and care for the sand like a miniature nature reserve.