Sustainable Arts invites students to be creative while reducing their carbon footprint.
Sustainable Arts (ARTS 1315) fuses science and art to further eco-friendly exploration at The University of Texas at Dallas this fall.
Piloted successfully in fall 2023 by Bass School Assistant Professor SV Randall, ARTS 1315 invites students from all disciplines to create while actively exploring ways to lessen their environmental impact.
Randall, an interdisciplinary artist, engaged graduate and undergraduate students in the cultivation and upkeep of the new Bass Natural Dye Garden to explore material foraging and harvesting of byproducts to create art.
Students from diverse academic backgrounds, including psychology, business, and engineering, participated in the course. In the Bass Natural Dye Garden, Randall and his students planted seeds for local plants that were compatible with specific art-making purposes, such as indigo, woad, madder, black-eyed Susans, Dyer’s coreopsis, zinnia, and marigold. After planting the seeds, the class cared for and maintained them.
“In considering our relationship with our environment and our history as humans extracting resources from it, we are at an exciting moment where we can reevaluate our perception of technology,” Randall said. “We often have a narrow understanding of what constitutes technology. Natural dyeing processes, for instance, can be as much a form of technology as developing software.”
As the plants flourished, students worked with local experts to forage materials and harvest art-making byproducts from these natural resources. They focused on producing natural dyes from the harvested plants for use in textile work.
Collaborating with an expert in pigment extraction, they learned techniques to derive pigments from dye vats, subsequently creating watercolor paints and inks. Among the materials used for natural pigments were acorns, black walnuts, and oak galls, mainly focusing on producing concentrated black ink. The course centered on sustainability processes that inspired ideas about ecological stewardship and permaculture technologies.
This fall, Bass School lecturer Val Curry MFA’14 will carry the ARTS 1315 baton.
Eco-friendly art practice has been central to Curry’s career for over a decade.
It all began about 10 years ago while he was pursuing his ATEC graduate degree at UT Dallas. At the time, his friend and colleague Robert was studying Emerging Media and Communication and working at Starbucks at Coit and Beltline. Together, they figured out how to give old, discarded newspapers a new life, inspiring them to launch a sculpture installation from waste material.
“We researched how to ground the newspapers with water and make totems, which were later composted in the ground, closing a full circle,” Curry said. “We had three or four exhibitions in Dallas and UTD.”
Around that time, he also hosted the exhibition Universe at McKinney Avenue Contemporary. The exhibit showcased a row of suspended, asteroid-like structures constructed from donated materials and painted with a brown rust coating.
The ARTS 1315 second cohort features Curry teaching techniques that merge science and art to recycle obsolete technology into new materials for their second run. From gathering ink from discarded printer cartridges to using electrolysis to break down old CPU metal casings into brown oxide particles for pigment, ARTS 1315 gives students new perspectives on the depth, breadth and possibilities of recycling and sustainability.
Communications Manager
Javier is a communications staffer who keeps the campus well-informed about the outstanding work the Bass School community produces. When he’s not at UT Dallas, Javier loves playing PS5 and indulging in his love for graphic novels.