Re-enchanting Volcanoes: The Rise, Fall, and Rise Again of Art and Aesthetics in the Making of Volcanic Knowledges

Abstract

Current day volcanology largely tends to an instrumentalist view of art as, in its mimetic form, capable of providing proxy data on the timing and unfolding of particular volcanic events and, in its impressionistic form, of conveying the sublime grandeur of volcanic events and scenes. In this chapter, we note that such a reductionist view of what science is unhelpfully glosses over a much more complex disciplinary lineage, wherein both art and aesthetics played a key role in knowledge production concerning volcanoes. Using the work of Sir William Hamilton and Mary Somerville as case studies, we emphasise that art and aesthetics were part and parcel of both an 18th and 19th century approach to the study of volcanoes, and the making of particular scientific audiences. What is more, it is this lineage that provides a creative reservoir for more recent efforts that cut across scientific and arts divides, such that the 'communication' of the nature of volcanoes becomes a multi-media, multi-affective endeavour that speaks to a diverse range of publics.

Intertwining volcanoes and society in Chile through arts and interdisciplinary connections

“…By means of imagination and sensations, these arts translate volcanic evocations into representations using colors, figures, and words, conforming another language to express volcanic qualities that emerge from human experience of sensible interaction with volcanoes. This language does not correspond to the scientific language but an imagined aesthetic language that captures multiple subjective ways of volcanic presence in human experience (Dixon and Beech, 2018;Soldati andIllingworth, 2020, Calvache andSánchez, 2021), perhaps not so different from the visions of volcanoes, and of nature in general, in premodern times in different cultures (e.g., Mariscotti de Görlitz, 1978;Grebe et al, 1972;Schlehe, 2008;Holmberg, 2023).…”

Intertwining volcanoes and society in Chile through arts and interdisciplinary connections

“…By means of imagination and sensations, arts translate volcanic evocations into representations using colors, figures, and words, conforming another language to express volcanic qualities that emerge from human experience of interaction with volcanoes. This language does not correspond to the scientific language but an imagined aesthetic language that captures multiple subjective ways of volcanic presence in human experience (Dixon and Beech, 2018;Soldati and Illingworth, 2020;Calvache and Sánchez, 2022;Sánchez and Posada, 2024), perhaps not so different from the visions of volcanoes, and of nature in general, in pre-modern times in different cultures (e.g., Mariscotti de Görlitz, 1978;Grebe et al, 1972;Schlehe, 2008;Holmberg, 2023;Sánchez and Posada, 2024).…”

Sublime encounters: Commodifying the experience of the geos

“…The affective value of the geos was clearly negotiated in tandem with the development of the philosophy of “reason” in the 18th and 19th centuries. This fluidity between the geological sciences and arts in the 18th century has been revived in recent accounts of the geosocial that emphasise the prospects of renewed fluidity for communication of science and a deeper understanding of the nature of knowledge (Dixon & Beech, ; Dixon et al., ). This paper seeks to further this analysis by considering encounters with the earth in the context of modern narratives of risk and commodification.…”