Art History Can Contribute to Environmental Sustainability, Professor Argues

Gabriella De Marco, professor of contemporary art history at the University of Palermo, published an open letter in Artribune addressed to Italian Minister of Education Lorenzo Fioramonti, arguing that art history and the humanities can play a constructive role in environmental sustainability. She emphasizes that contemporary art history already engages with urgent issues such as climate, migration, gender, and eco-sustainable materials through iconographic research, historical contextualization, and digital tools. De Marco cites examples including 19th-century landscape painting for understanding environmental change, the 20th-century Italian debate on rural architecture (referencing Pagano and Michelucci) for insights on local materials, and international art and architecture biennials for addressing climate and migration. She also highlights urban art forms like public art, parks, and street art as intersecting with hydraulic engineering, citing Copenhagen's student housing built with recycled materials and post-flood urban transformations after the 2011 disaster. De Marco calls for interdisciplinary dialogue between the sciences and humanities, rejecting a hierarchy of knowledge, and positions art history as a sensor of contemporary issues rather than a mere reflection of the zeitgeist.