Similarities Between What Is Missing And Nuage Vert
Take a second to imagine Earth without life. Nothing but a barren and desolate sea of beige sand where vibrant and healthy palm trees used to exist as they billowed in the wind along the side of the Los Angeles highway. Every sloth, jaguar, and river dolphin has completely disappeared from the once bountiful and lush Amazon Rainforest, leaving behind only the eerie sound of silence and sadness. At the rate that humans today consume our planets non-renewable resources, such as natural gas and fossil fuels, along with destroying the natural habitats that many of our rare and endangered species need to survive, the human race is inching closer and closer every day towards a dry and lifeless planet Earth. Environmental artists, such as Helen Evans,
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Heiko Hansen (collectively known as HeHe) and Maya Lin, have put their artistic and creative abilities to work to not only create breathtaking pieces of art but also to educate and inform the general public of the current state of crisis that the Earth and many of its species are undergoing. Both of these artists focus on educating people on environmental issues such as waste, climate change, habitat sustainability, resources and reforms through digital and public art . While Lin's approach with her memorial-styled project What Is Missing? (2009-ongoing) is more technological and done with photo and video, HeHe's project Nuage Vert (2008) uses an art medium called social practice, which encourages the participation and the opinions of the public (in this case Helsinki, Finland) to help bring the art and its environmental meaning to life. Although both projects do a fantastic job at bringing important environmental issues to the forefront, Maya Lin's What Is Missing? has more potential to effect the environment and people's attitudes towards the environment in a positive manner due to its longevity. Maya Lin is no stranger to the hard work and dedication it takes to complete a memorial, as she is most well known for The Vietnam Veterans Memorial, which many call the worlds most moving war monument, that she designed and established back in 1982 when she was an undergraduate student at Yale . After the enormous success of this memorial, she decided to create another memorial, but on a more complex scale, about an issue that she cared deeply for. What Lin calls her "last memorial project", What Is Missing? is "a global multimedia project aimed at drawing attention to the rapid loss of biodiversity and natural abundance" . What Is Missing? is a combination of the public art, digital art, and photo/video genres and exists on an online format as well as multiple physical locations around the world, creating public awareness of the sudden sixth mass extinction currently impacting several different species and habitats right in our own backyards. The artistic strategies that Lin used within this memorial are clear. Lin shared that she intended to instruct the public and educate the youth on the current state of crisis that nature is presently undergoing when she said "I am going to try to wake you up to things that are missing that you are not even aware are disappearing... if I can get you to look at something afresh, maybe you will pay closer attention." in an interview with Environmental360. In To Life! by Linda Weintraub, it explains that Lin uses certain other artistic strategies such as metaphorizing, which "refers to the use of comparison to denote a kind of object, action or condition," and visualizing, which is art "designed to manifest abstract data and invisible forces with the goal of increasing public awareness and motivating modifications in behavior" through photos, videos, animations and other mediums. Another team of incredible and creative eco-artists would be Helen Evans and Heiko Hansen, collectively known HeHe. In 2008, the duo finally finalized their project Nuage Vert (translated to "green cloud") in Helsinki, Finland, which shone a light on the important environmental issue of air pollution and the immensity of the capital cities energy consumption. At 500 feet up, Nuage Vert is a bright green laser beam that illuminates the amount of emissions coming from the Salmisaari power plant in the night sky. This public projects illumination actively adjusts its shape and size to perfectly contour the amount of emissions coming from the power plant in real time . When residents on the same power grid consume more energy, the green illumination grows, leading to locals beginning to visualize the enormous amounts of non-renewable energy that they are consuming on a day-to-day basis. The only technology necessary for this project was some thermographic cameras and a high power laser light . Along with combining public and digital art, Nuage Vert was also what artists call "social practice", which means that tenable environmental projects can only flourish if a relationship and collaboration with the public is incorporated somehow . Nuage Vert could be described as a performance art, with artistic strategies such as instructing the public to use less energy, creating a visualization to spark a sense of responsibility in the residents of Helsinki, along with accentuating the air pollution issue by conveying it in such an intense manner that the audience feels some sort of emotion towards it . When analyzing What Is Missing? and Nuage Vert together, some of the artistic strategies and ecological issues being focused on are similar. For instance, both artists made each of these projects extremely public , in hopes of reaching out to a large audience in order to educate them on particular topics, spark emotion and thought, and encourage actions to be taken. These projects were both collaborations between artists, scientists, and the communities exposed to the work. Both artists relied on digital art and technology as well, as Maya Lin developed an extensive website along with her photography and videography , and HeHe took advantage of their technological resources via thermographic cameras and high power laser beams . When it comes to artistic strategies, Lin and HeHe desired to instruct, educate and develop extensive visualizations for their audiences to take to heart. Another practice common to both of these projects is what artists call "perturbing", which means to make someone anxious or disturbed in some way . Nuage Vert intended to get the people of Helsinki to trigger feelings of anxiety about the amount of energy they were consuming, in hopes that they would consume less. What Is Missing? intends to make it's audience feel unsettled about the amount of species that have been completely killed off in hopes of communities coming together to end habitat loss and degradation. Both of these projects focus on ecological issues such as waste, climate change, habitat sustainability and our Earth's resources. Although each artist may have incorporated several genres, issues and strategies that made their artworks alike, there are many contrasts between What Is Missing?
and Nuage Vert that make each project unique. While HeHe was more into social practice and dramatizing their work , Lin stuck to mostly photography and videography and metaphorizing her work to gain more public appeal. What Is Missing? put a spotlight on the sixth mass extinction while Nuage Vert emphasized its goal to improve Helsinki's air quality by broadcasting the negative effects of overusing non-renewable resources. The main difference between the two projects is longevity. Lin has used the Internet to create a website that will last forever, birthing an "expandable, multifaceted system" to accommodate the constantly-evolving status of extinct animals and themes of the memorial instead of a "grandiose monument that is fixed in space and time". As for HeHe's project, it will not last forever, but it will provide lasting information on how energy consumption was lessened when the community was presented with an unavoidable reminder of how much energy they are using. What Is Missing? can be classified as a memorial, while Nuage Vert could be seen as more of an
experiment. In a time when the Earth is more vulnerable than ever, eco-artists such as HeHe and Maya Lin are imperative to keep reminding the human race that they are not the only lives that share this planet. The Nuage Vert by HeHe made an intense and unavoidable statement that raised public awareness on energy consumption in a creative and artistic way. What Is Missing? by Maya Lin has and will continue to benefit the Earth in a positive way by shedding light on the many species that have been killed off due to human interference with their habitats in hopes that actions will be taken to conserve and preserve these amazing creatures. Due to its constantly evolving nature and longevity, What Is Missing? proves itself to be one of the most powerful eco-art pieces and memorials to ever have come into existence, with Nuage Vert trailing not too far behind it.
Heiko Hansen (collectively known as HeHe) and Maya Lin, have put their artistic and creative abilities to work to not only create breathtaking pieces of art but also to educate and inform the general public of the current state of crisis that the Earth and many of its species are undergoing. Both of these artists focus on educating people on environmental issues such as waste, climate change, habitat sustainability, resources and reforms through digital and public art . While Lin's approach with her memorial-styled project What Is Missing? (2009-ongoing) is more technological and done with photo and video, HeHe's project Nuage Vert (2008) uses an art medium called social practice, which encourages the participation and the opinions of the public (in this case Helsinki, Finland) to help bring the art and its environmental meaning to life. Although both projects do a fantastic job at bringing important environmental issues to the forefront, Maya Lin's What Is Missing? has more potential to effect the environment and people's attitudes towards the environment in a positive manner due to its longevity. Maya Lin is no stranger to the hard work and dedication it takes to complete a memorial, as she is most well known for The Vietnam Veterans Memorial, which many call the worlds most moving war monument, that she designed and established back in 1982 when she was an undergraduate student at Yale . After the enormous success of this memorial, she decided to create another memorial, but on a more complex scale, about an issue that she cared deeply for. What Lin calls her "last memorial project", What Is Missing? is "a global multimedia project aimed at drawing attention to the rapid loss of biodiversity and natural abundance" . What Is Missing? is a combination of the public art, digital art, and photo/video genres and exists on an online format as well as multiple physical locations around the world, creating public awareness of the sudden sixth mass extinction currently impacting several different species and habitats right in our own backyards. The artistic strategies that Lin used within this memorial are clear. Lin shared that she intended to instruct the public and educate the youth on the current state of crisis that nature is presently undergoing when she said "I am going to try to wake you up to things that are missing that you are not even aware are disappearing... if I can get you to look at something afresh, maybe you will pay closer attention." in an interview with Environmental360. In To Life! by Linda Weintraub, it explains that Lin uses certain other artistic strategies such as metaphorizing, which "refers to the use of comparison to denote a kind of object, action or condition," and visualizing, which is art "designed to manifest abstract data and invisible forces with the goal of increasing public awareness and motivating modifications in behavior" through photos, videos, animations and other mediums. Another team of incredible and creative eco-artists would be Helen Evans and Heiko Hansen, collectively known HeHe. In 2008, the duo finally finalized their project Nuage Vert (translated to "green cloud") in Helsinki, Finland, which shone a light on the important environmental issue of air pollution and the immensity of the capital cities energy consumption. At 500 feet up, Nuage Vert is a bright green laser beam that illuminates the amount of emissions coming from the Salmisaari power plant in the night sky. This public projects illumination actively adjusts its shape and size to perfectly contour the amount of emissions coming from the power plant in real time . When residents on the same power grid consume more energy, the green illumination grows, leading to locals beginning to visualize the enormous amounts of non-renewable energy that they are consuming on a day-to-day basis. The only technology necessary for this project was some thermographic cameras and a high power laser light . Along with combining public and digital art, Nuage Vert was also what artists call "social practice", which means that tenable environmental projects can only flourish if a relationship and collaboration with the public is incorporated somehow . Nuage Vert could be described as a performance art, with artistic strategies such as instructing the public to use less energy, creating a visualization to spark a sense of responsibility in the residents of Helsinki, along with accentuating the air pollution issue by conveying it in such an intense manner that the audience feels some sort of emotion towards it . When analyzing What Is Missing? and Nuage Vert together, some of the artistic strategies and ecological issues being focused on are similar. For instance, both artists made each of these projects extremely public , in hopes of reaching out to a large audience in order to educate them on particular topics, spark emotion and thought, and encourage actions to be taken. These projects were both collaborations between artists, scientists, and the communities exposed to the work. Both artists relied on digital art and technology as well, as Maya Lin developed an extensive website along with her photography and videography , and HeHe took advantage of their technological resources via thermographic cameras and high power laser beams . When it comes to artistic strategies, Lin and HeHe desired to instruct, educate and develop extensive visualizations for their audiences to take to heart. Another practice common to both of these projects is what artists call "perturbing", which means to make someone anxious or disturbed in some way . Nuage Vert intended to get the people of Helsinki to trigger feelings of anxiety about the amount of energy they were consuming, in hopes that they would consume less. What Is Missing? intends to make it's audience feel unsettled about the amount of species that have been completely killed off in hopes of communities coming together to end habitat loss and degradation. Both of these projects focus on ecological issues such as waste, climate change, habitat sustainability and our Earth's resources. Although each artist may have incorporated several genres, issues and strategies that made their artworks alike, there are many contrasts between What Is Missing?
and Nuage Vert that make each project unique. While HeHe was more into social practice and dramatizing their work , Lin stuck to mostly photography and videography and metaphorizing her work to gain more public appeal. What Is Missing? put a spotlight on the sixth mass extinction while Nuage Vert emphasized its goal to improve Helsinki's air quality by broadcasting the negative effects of overusing non-renewable resources. The main difference between the two projects is longevity. Lin has used the Internet to create a website that will last forever, birthing an "expandable, multifaceted system" to accommodate the constantly-evolving status of extinct animals and themes of the memorial instead of a "grandiose monument that is fixed in space and time". As for HeHe's project, it will not last forever, but it will provide lasting information on how energy consumption was lessened when the community was presented with an unavoidable reminder of how much energy they are using. What Is Missing? can be classified as a memorial, while Nuage Vert could be seen as more of an
experiment. In a time when the Earth is more vulnerable than ever, eco-artists such as HeHe and Maya Lin are imperative to keep reminding the human race that they are not the only lives that share this planet. The Nuage Vert by HeHe made an intense and unavoidable statement that raised public awareness on energy consumption in a creative and artistic way. What Is Missing? by Maya Lin has and will continue to benefit the Earth in a positive way by shedding light on the many species that have been killed off due to human interference with their habitats in hopes that actions will be taken to conserve and preserve these amazing creatures. Due to its constantly evolving nature and longevity, What Is Missing? proves itself to be one of the most powerful eco-art pieces and memorials to ever have come into existence, with Nuage Vert trailing not too far behind it.