The interview discusses the prospects for building an ecological civilization in Russia. One of the important angles of analysis is the idea of the opposition between different tendencies in Russia's civilizational development, the ideological and technological. Overcoming this opposition will require a third, ecological tendency. In the interview, the eco-integral approach to the study of the prospects ‘for the development of Russian civilization is substantiated, based on the strategy of the harmonious unity of people with the socio-natural environment. An ecological civilization is a human-sized, technologically-advanced, socially-sustainable and spiritually-oriented civilization, the development of which is aimed at maintaining and developing all forms of life. This is how Yurij Reznik imagines the civilization of the future Russia, the contours of which are outlined in the interview.
This review highlights the recent monographic exhibition Helen and Newton Harrison: California Work, curated by Tatiana Sizonenko, PhD, as part of the Getty Foundation’s Pacific Standard Time, Art & Science Collide, 2024-25. The exhibition, which was presented across the four art galleries in San Diego, provided an overview of Helen and Newton Harrisons’ collaborative artistic practice that bridged conceptual art, science, and ecology. The Harrisons dedicated five decades of their pioneering work to the restoration of ecosystems. By agreeing “to do no work that does not benefit the well-being of the Web of Life,” the Harrisons reimagined the responsibility of the artist and the arts towards the unfolding planetary crisis.
The article proposes and substantiates the phenomenon of natural archetypes as a new category of ecopsychology. Considered from the point of view of the eco-human approach, archetypes of nature are thought-forms and works of world culture, combining various natural phenomena and objects, on the one hand, and human properties, the world of mental phenomena, on the other hand. Using Koestler's ideas about holons and holarchies, and Wilber's four fundamental abilities of holons (self-preservation, self-adaptation, self-transcendence and self-utilization), the author shows how these abilities are realized in human relations with the natural world.
The following article and imagery represent the experience of dwelling over time, with an image that arose in response to a figure I noticed looking up at me from a biologically damaged stream during the solar eclipse of April 8, 2024. I sat with the drawing and the live video of the figure for over a year, concerned for the welfare of the water and not knowing what to do. Recently, I suddenly felt compelled to invite the figure in the image to guide me toward the creation of another artwork. What arose was a composite (collage) in which the figure was removed from my drawing of the toxic water and placed in a photograph of a clean clear mountain creek. The resulting piece became a visual prayer for the Creek Woman and the health of the water in which she shared her Being. The article also briefly covers, as context, the research of Emoto Masaru, the Sacred speech of Pat McCab, the historical antecedents of the Creeks given name, and mythological potentialities.
This poetry series emerges from an ecopoietic engagement with landscapes marked by both beauty and devastation. These are geographies that have not only witnessed the erasure and displacement of human communities but have also endured ecological violence, forests burned, rivers polluted, and ecosystems disrupted by military occupation and extractive policies. The work draws on ecopoiesis as a mode of poetic co-creation with the more-than human world. Rather than seeing nature as a passive object or romantic background, ecopoiesis affirms its agency, memory, and capacity for regeneration.
This report highlights recent publications that showcase the progress and vision in ecological civilization construction in China and Russia. Russia released its first academic anthology on ecological civilization, advocating for a shift from industrial to ecological civilization. In China, a series of new books—including Contemporary China’s Ecological Environment, Integrated Development of Forest and Grassland National Parks, New-Type Urbanization with Chinese Characteristics, and Carbon Balance of Forest Ecosystems in China—explore ecological development from philosophical, urban, environmental, and scientific perspectives. These works emphasize the importance of cultural heritage, systemic transformation, and global cooperation in building a sustainable and harmonious relationship between humanity and nature.
In this article, the author explores the concept of ecopoiesis through the ecological and aesthetic dimensions of Hayao Miyazaki's cinema. Drawing on Stephen K. Levine’s poietic ecology framework, the analysis focuses on Princess Mononoke, Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, and Spirited Away to investigate how nature is represented not merely as a passive background or resource but as a co-creating, sentient subject. The paper first elaborates the theoretical foundations of ecopoiesis, rooted in Heidegger’s notion of poiesis and extended through Levine’s expressive arts perspective. It additionally places these ideas in context these ideas within Japanese cultural philosophy—particularly the Shinto worldview, mono no aware, and yūgen—to highlight the cultural resonance of Miyazaki’s work. This shows that Miyazaki’s films offer an embodied, sensory, and ethical relationship with nature that transcends dichotomies such as nature vs. technology or preservation vs. exploitation. His films act as poetic sites where ecological awareness and existential responsibility intertwine. In the end, it is argued that ecopoiesis, as manifested in Miyazaki’s narratives, offers not only an analytical lens but also an alternative life orientation—an aesthetic, ethical, and co-creative mode of being with the world in the face of intensifying ecological crises.
We live in a time of ecological crisis. The world we live in has almost been destroyed by industrial pollution, war, neglect and overdevelopment. The concept of the Anthropocene, the sense that today there is no such thing as nature independent of human activity, signifies ultimately that we have created a world in which we may destroy ourselves. However, although we are part of nature, we do have a special relationship to it, indicating this by the term, “ecopoiesis.” The word “poiesis,” from the Greek for art-making, means a capacity to respond to what is given and to shape it in a way that aims at beauty. Of course, our shaping may aim at profit or domination rather than beauty, but even our mis-shaping shows us that we are, we might say, ecopoietic by nature. We are not only ecological but ecopoietic beings.
We are pleased to introduce new materials for this section of our journal. We see poiesis as providing the basis for human beings' creative responses to the world of nature. The arts in particular offer forms that crystallize these responses in ways that touch and move us. "In Resonance with the Earth" contains poetry, artworks, photography and essays relevant to this theme. In this issue of the journal, this section includes poetry and artworks by Judith Greer Essex and Jenna Montgomery and a new series of poems by Stephen K. Levine and Alexander Kopytin.
We are pleased to introduce new materials for this section of our journal. We see poiesis as providing the basis for human beings' creative responses to the world of nature. The arts in particular offer forms that crystallize these responses in ways that touch and move us. "In Resonance with the Earth" contains poetry, artworks, photography and essays relevant to this theme. In this issue of the journal, this section includes poetry and artworks by Judith Greer Essex and Jenna Montgomery and a new series of poems by Stephen K. Levine and Alexander Kopytin.
The article discusses the issue of the ambiguous relationship between nature and art, as shown in the works of artists and by clients’ work in art therapy. The work of some contemporary artists who turned to the depiction of nature or the study of human relations to nature, such as Joseph Beuys, Andy Goldsworthy, Claude Monet and Thomas Wrede, are commented on. Brief descriptions of examples of artistic design of a psychiatric hospital and of the reflection of nature through art in the psychiatric hospital in Münster (Germany), as well as interaction with the natural world during art therapy, in particular, with patients suffering from oncological diseases, are given.
The role of photography in providing a meaningful human connection to nature is analyzed. Some reasons why photography can be a valuable means of nature-based practices supporting the development of environmental consciousness are presented and illustrated with examples of photographs and projects that took place in different countries. Considerations are also provided which show why photography helps to explore and change people’s perception of nature, to feel in control and appropriate the environment, maintain and develop ecological identity, and to develop mindfulness and a sense of physical presence in the environment.
The article examines the way in which the human body produces the unity of the cultural and natural dimensions of the human being. The body acts as the natural basis of humans, connecting us with the organic foundations of natural life. At the same time, the arts act as a means of organizing and expressing different aspects of human bodily experience. The role of expressive arts and therapy with expressive arts is outlined. It is emphasized that expressive arts restore our connection with the body, nature and traditional cultures, returning ancient wisdom to humans in modern conditions.
In this interview, British environmental arts therapist, Gary Nash, talks about the growing area of nature-based creative arts-therapy practice in the UK and environmental arts therapies initiatives that he and his colleagues have developed. He makes a special tribute to the memory of his colleague and the pioneer of environmental arts therapy, Ian Siddons Heginworth, who has sadly passed this year.
The quest to create an ecological civilization has been promoted by eco-Marxists committed to creating some form of eco-socialism. It is suggested in this paper that what is meant by all these terms is problematic, but they can be clarified by defining them through concepts deriving from ecology, and as such, the quest for ecological civilization can be seen as the quest to develop and realize an ‘ecological culture’, taking ecology as the root metaphor for comprehending the whole of reality. It is argued that the concept of ecopoiesis, deriving from ecology, provides a bridge between the natural sciences and the humanities, providing the basis for the reformulation of the social sciences and political philosophy required to create a new world order, an order that is committed to augmenting the life of the biosphere and human communities at all levels, while facilitating the comprehension of humanity as part of nature required to achieve this.
We are pleased to introduce new materials for this section of our journal. We see poiesis as providing the basis for human beings' creative responses to the world of nature. The arts in particular offer forms that crystallize these responses in ways that touch and move us. "In Resonance with the Earth" contains poetry, artworks, photography and essays relevant to this theme. In this issue of the journal, this section includes poetry and artworks by Judith Greer Essex and Jenna Montgomery and a new series of poems by Stephen K. Levine and Alexander Kopytin.
We are pleased to introduce a new section of our journal, "In Resonance with the Earth." We see poiesis as providing the basis for human beings' creative responses to the world of nature. The arts in particular offer forms that crystallize these responses in ways that touch and move us. "In Resonance with the Earth" contains poetry, artworks, photography and essays relevant to this theme. In this issue of the journal, this section includes an essay by Vadim Ryabikov and a poem by Alexander Kopytin (recitation by Alexandra Kirillova).
The article examines the influence of the Moon as a celestial body of the solar system, closely connected with the Earth, on humans. It is shown how, through creative activity in the interaction of humans with this celestial body, new meanings and forms of experience are formed and their renewal in culture takes place. In this case, the Moon acts not only as a physical object, but also as one of the natural archetypes, due to which a complex of human potentials is realized in their connection with the environment. When considering the Moon as a natural phenomenon, special attention is paid to those types of activities when it is perceived through the prism of non-pragmatic, artistic and aesthetic experience, closely related to the sense of beauty. When considering this mode of perception of the Moon, the concepts of poiesis and ecopoiesis are used.
There is a complex turmoil taking place in the world in this historical moment: violence in Gaza, and war in Ukraine involved the whole world community and revealed the fragility and dysfunctional nature of the state of affairs. In this issue of the journal, both world environmental traditions and new ideas in ecology are contributing to a new eco-human approach to understanding the world and humanity. The constructiveness of the eco-human approach or a paradigm is determined by systemic environmental thinking. “Ecology” is a radical system-forming concept necessary to rethink the entire cultural practice of humankind and realize new opportunities to solve the problems of preserving humanity and the planet.
The new section of our journal, “Poetic Anthology of Eco-Human Experience”, presents poetry from different ages, dedicated to various facets of our human relationship with the moon as a natural object. Poetic works allow us to comprehend the eco-human, eco-poietic nuances of our ability, together with this natural phenomenon, to generate new facets of subjectivity, to discover new forms of experience and meanings revealed on the threshold of human and more-than-human reality.
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