From Aesthetic Shock to Ethical Awakening: How an Environmental Artist and Activist Found Purpose
Contributed by Subhankar Banerjee, environmental activist, photographer, and professor at the University of New Mexico
Environmental activist, photographer, and teacher Subhankar Banerjee recounts a time, shortly after moving to New Mexico, when he walked out of his house to encounter a small dead bird lying motionless on the porch. This humble, private moment of grief, confusion, and aesthetic complexity echoed the sensations he had previously felt while viewing Albert Pinkham Ryder’s 19th-century painting “The Dead Bird.” As Banerjee’s career has evolved to address the large-scale crisis of global biological annihilation, he still emphasizes that this small interaction between the human and non-human affected him profoundly and set him on a lifelong ethical journey.
Title
From Aesthetic Shock to Ethical Awakening: How an Environmental Artist and Activist Found Purpose
Description
Environmental activist, photographer, and teacher Subhankar Banerjee recounts a time, shortly after moving to New Mexico, when he walked out of his house to encounter a small dead bird lying motionless on the porch. This humble, private moment of grief, confusion, and aesthetic complexity echoed the sensations he had previously felt while viewing Albert Pinkham Ryder’s 19th-century painting “The Dead Bird.” As Banerjee’s career has evolved to address the large-scale crisis of global biological annihilation, he still emphasizes that this small interaction between the human and non-human affected him profoundly and set him on a lifelong ethical journey.
Contributor
Subhankar Banerjee, environmental activist, photographer, and professor at the University of New Mexico
Identifier
subhankar-banerjee-aesthetics-ethics
Player
Referrer
Beyond Despair environmental humanities conference