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Nature and Us

Lecturer-researcher Marieke van den Doel was awarded an NWO Museum Grant (a grant from the Dutch Research Council) for her project Nature & Us, in collaboration with the Stedelijk Museum Alkmaar. She investigated early modern views on the relationship between nature and humans. To this end, she examined early modern landscape painting from the museum’s collection. Does this provide new inspiration for our thinking about humans and nature? 

Description

Will Alkmaar soon be flooded if we do not put a stop to the fossil fuel industry? The way in which and the period in which human activities have permanently altered the Earth’s atmosphere and geology is referred to as the Anthropocene. A certain way of thinking is often cited as the cause: Western thinking, because it is said to have contributed to a human-centred – an anthropocentric – worldview. Researcher Braidotti (2013) suggests that this worldview took shape in the early modern period, referring to Pico della Mirandola’s De hominis dignitate (1486) and Leonardo da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man (c. 1490). 

The Nature & Us project investigates early modern views on the relationship between nature and humans. Artworks show how these ideas have been depicted over time. Using landscape paintings in the collection of the Stedelijk Museum Alkmaar, the project investigates whether the paintings show a human-centred perspective or an ecocentric one. Early modern depictions of nature, such as those by Jan van Scorel (1495-1562), Guilliam du Gardijn (1595/6-1647/57) and Allart van Everdingen (1621-1675), are analysed on the basis of contemporary sources on this subject, such as Willem Goerees’ Inleydinge tot de al-ghemeene teycken-konst (1670) and De Zichtbaere Werelt (1678) by Samuel van Hoogstraten, but also through contemporary eco-humanist philosophers, in particular Bruno Latour (1947-2022) and Hartmut Rosa (1967). Does this self-examination provide tools or inspiration for a revised relationship between humans and nature?  

Researcher

(Co-)funding 

The NWO Museum Grant is awarded to projects that conduct scientific, innovative and relevant research for society and the museum sector. 

Contact

Marieke van den Doel, m.vandendoel@uvh.nl