BART 92A15 - Pictorial Ecologies: Field, Matter, and Affect

The entanglement of human activity and natural processes — which defines the Anthropocene — finds a poetic resonance in Le Havre.

Here, the dialogue between sea, land, and industry reveals both resilience and transformation: from coastal erosion and port infrastructures to the quiet rewilding of abandoned sites. The city becomes a living archive of coexistence between production, memory, and ecology. Rooted in this dynamic landscape, the workshop explores the relationship between ecology, perception, and materiality through pictorial and textural practices. Students will engage in field observation, material collection, and artistic experimentation using organic matter such as plants, minerals, pigments, and found textures.

Each participant will compose a research-creation sketchbook — combining drawing, collage, writing, and pigment studies — as a way to transform observation into creation, and material experience into ecological reflection.

By linking artistic practice, ecological awareness, and sensorial reflection, this workshop invites students to imagine new forms of coexistence between the human, the vegetal, and the industrial worlds — cultivating an art of care, attention, and transformation.

At the end of the course, the student is expected to : 1°) Understand key concepts in environmental humanities, eco-aesthetics, and material ecology through fieldwork and artistic experimentation; 2°) Explore how pictorial and textural practices can embody ecological thinking and foster awareness of coexistence between human, vegetal, and industrial worlds; 3°) Develop a personal research-creation methodology that integrates observation, material collection, and artistic composition into an ecologically grounded reflection. The course alternates between lectures, fieldwork, studio work, and collective critique sessions. Students will work both outdoors (urban and coastal field observation) and indoors (drawing, collage, pigment preparation). Group discussions and reflective writing foster dialogue between practice and theory.

To validate the course, the student is expected to pass the following assignments :

1°) Field Journal (20%) — Collection of observations, sketches, and materials from site visits in Le Havre.

2°) Reflection Essay (30%) — A short written reflection (2–3 pages) linking artistic process with ecological and phenomenological ideas discussed in class

3°) Final Research-Creation Sketchbook (50%) — A completed sketchbook combining drawing, collage, writing, and material experimentation, presented and discussed during the final session.