CALL FOR PAPERS: FROM SPLENDOR TO NECESSITY IN THE ART-NATURE BINOMIUM
Editors
Manu vb Tintoré
Carlos H. Sierra
Nicolás Jiménez
We are pleased to announce the call for papers for the third issue of Cosmotheoros, the International Journal of Environmental Epistemology. This issue intends to delve into the myriad and changing forms in which nature, throughout human history, is to be found present in artistic disciplines. From that perspective, the specific content selection criteria are guided by the broadest possible prospect to approach the art-nature binomium from music, architecture, sculpture and even poetry and literature, and not exclusively from of the performing and visual arts, both traditional and contemporary. Although both concepts of «art» and «nature», given its inherent multivocality, are not subdued to a taut definition and more likely are held to controverted disputes, the main focus of this issue departs from idea that nature – understood as a motive of primordial representation under the artistic point of view – has a close and intimate relationship with that sort of anthropological condition that is essential to human activity by which meaning is given the world (whether from a ritual, magical, religious, aesthetic, philosophical, metaphysical, moral or sociopolitical perspective). Under this standpoint is no coincidence that this deep relation has been understood through the horizon of pretensions exhorted in each historical time: first as a source of inspiration, later as oblivion and estrangement and, finally, as a pressing necessity. But there is much more than this. In this complicated, and yet fascinating game of connections, bonds, influxes, and conjunctions, some suggest, like Philippe Descola, a beyond (par-delà), perhaps utopic and dreamy, in which all discontinuity and contrast are diluted.
Additionally, art in all its varied expressions, trends, tendencies, and approaches has usually been one of the most prominent ways of attributing and disseminating values with respect to the natural world and, therefore, a significant reference that has determined, in each specific period of history, the nature of the relationship between man and cosmos. In this way, artistic representation through constant metaphors, symbols, allegories, perceptive states, surreptitious narratives, sensory guides, or emotional environments, metabolize, incorporate, and «introject» in the personal internal stance the radical otherness of the external world. That is way Joseph Campbell, for instance, envisage in of both the mistic and the artist similar paths, to the extent that they seek to bring forth the hidden and profound aspects of the mysterious into the realm of comprehensive intuition. This connection ultimately aligns the theme to be addressed in this issue with the ideas of Friedrich Nietzsche (or with their variations by Friedrich W. J. Schelling or J. W. Goethe) around the thesis that art, in some way, is the intrinsic task of life in its most metaphysical aspect and, therefore, originates from nature itself (as a creative and productive force).
The International Journal of Environmental Epistemology Cosmotheoros invites submissions for this special issue dedicated to nature from the perspective of art, encompassing philosophical, scientific, aesthetic, historical, symbolic, psychological, anthropological, myth-religious, sociological, and other approaches. Below, we share some possible topics (although they are not limiting):
- Art as a mirror of nature: the mode of interpreting nature through different historical periods, artistic contexts, and individual artworks.
- Artistic disciplines as a mechanism for attributing values to nature.
- Nature under aesthetic dominion: art as a system of control and domestication of the natural. the sublime and the terrifying in nature through artworks.
- Nature exposed to artistic representation: allegories, metaphors, symbols, illustrations, emblems, etc.
- Beyond reality: imagined natures and other worlds through artistic practice.
- Art as a pivot: aesthetic modulations in the human-nature relationship.
- The universe through artistic optics.
- Art and the development of life sciences: when art and science converge.
- Hybrid spaces between artistic practices and technoscience: nature as creative material.
- The role of art in philosophical debates and controversies about nature.
Check here our Submission guidelines
The deadline for paper submissions is April 1, 2024, through the email cosmotheoros.editorial@gmail.com.
For more information, please contact the editors of the Cosmotheoros:
Carlos Hugo Sierra: carlos.ehu@gmail.com
Nicolás Jiménez Iguarán: nicolasjimeneziguaran@gmail.com