Inviting the unforeseen: a dialogue about art, learning and sustainability

To effectively grasp and address sustainability challenges, this chapter argues that we need to expand our predominantly logocentric and linear ways of knowing with more presentational, embodied and sensory means. The chapter traces an exploration of this position through a dialogue between four academic, artistic practitioners. It proposes the integration of art in (learning) processes for sustainability as a means to hold ambiguity, embrace the unknown and move ahead despite uncertainty. Art is introduced as a process that inherently and purposefully accepts and deploys (rather than minimizes) the latter elements. The authors subsequently touch upon a range of features of artistic processes that foster the emergence of these qualities: i.e. imagination, connection, embodiment and estrangement. Some of which might inspire educators, academics, decisionmakers and activist to adopt a more aesthetic, connective mode of experiencing, thinking and doing, thereby generating conditions that allow for active, connective and imaginative making instead of routinely adopting the ready-made. © Wageningen Academic Publishers, The Netherlands, 2012.