Laura Donkers
Connecting people with ecology through art to captivate and inform towards more creative and sustainable ways to live. I specialise in strategic community engagement and behaviour-change projects that transform public perception of ecology and sustainability.
As a practice-led research artist, I make environmental works on paper, video, sound and sculpture. I also research, design, and lead outdoor arts workshops and projects that motivate the public to ‘get out into nature'. Collaborations with local communities and stakeholders promote ecological responsibility and sustainability through experiential learning and new modes of creative activity to put them back in touch with environment, community, and self.
Lives and works in the Outer Hebrides (Scotland) and Auckland (Aotearoa NZ)
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[1] ‘Nature is too big to understand – we are interested only in the part of nature on which we live – the thin skin – the ‘critical zone’. Bruno Latour presented on "From the Anthropocene to the New Climatic Regime" at the RCC Lunchtime Colloquium on Thursday, 8 December, 2016.
Published on Apr 18, 2017
Education
2021
Contemporary Curating in Art + Design, Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design, University of Dundee.
2020
PhD Contemporary Art Practice, Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design, University of Dundee. AHRC Creative Economies funded research entitled Deploying collaborative artistic co-creative methods to strategically promote eco-social regeneration for small island communities
2014
MFA Art Society and Publics, Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design, Dundee
2011
BA Fine Art Honours (First Class) - UHI, Moray School of Art, Elgin
Exhibitions (Solo)
2019
RE- Generation, NorthArt, Northcote, Auckland, Aotearoa NZ
2019
Meeting Ground, Taigh Chearsabhagh Museum & Art Centre, North Uist UK
2017
Apparitions DJCAD, Dundee UK 2017: Monument Game Tournament Cultivating Perspectives on Landscape, St Andrews University UK
2017
Proposition for a Reading Group Stuff of Research, Kelvin Hall, Glasgow UK
2015
Proposition for a Reading Group Taigh Chearsabhagh Museum & Art Centre, North Uist UK
2014
Landship Public Art sculptural intervention for Dundee City Council, Magdalen Green, Dundee UK
Exhibitions( Group show)
2021
Touching Wood, ArtWeek Auckland, Grey Lynn, Auckland
Land Radius2, Dear 2050 Oceans on the Rise, Climanosco, Zurich, Switzerland
Land Radius, High Water 8.30-22.00 on 30.03.21. An online 'celebration and vigil of the vernal spring tide' with 60 artists from across the world.
2020
Wild Garden, Whenua Ūkaipō Connectedness 2020, a celebration of te taiao/the natural environment, the United Nations at 75, Public Trust Hall, Wellington, Aotearoa NZ
Entangle Edge and Surface, The Book as Art v8.0: Infinity. Decatur, Georgia, USA
2019
Path Drawing/Apparitions. Rock-Paper-Scissors. Expanded Drawing Exhibition, Circus Artspace, Inverness, UK
2017
Entangle Edge and Surface. In the Open, Sheffield Institute of Art, Sheffield, UK
Wasserwirtschaftliche (Water management). Spurensuche (Traces), Galerie am Kietz, Germany
2016
You are not outside. Weit Genug, Kulturzentrum Klosterkirche, Angermunde, Germany
Wall Paper Plant. Open Studios DRAWinternational Studio Exhibition, Caylus, Midi-Pyrennes, France
Worlding Place. Art and Geography Exhibition, CIG, St Patricks College DCU, Dublin
The Monument Game – Performance, Timespan, Helmsdale, Scotland
Vancouver Biennale I Have a Dream Global Art, Farming & Peace Project
2015
Tha mi a bruadair. Faith in Paris, Raising Farmers Voices in Paris, 'Faith in Paris' ArtCOP21
DRAWinternational Studio Exhibition, Caylus, Midi-Pyrennes, France
Proposition for a Reading Group, Performance, Taigh Chearsabhagh Museum & Art Centre
2014
Land Radius. SSA Annual Exhibition, National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh
'So much depends upon…' Members Lounge, Scottish Parliament; The Tent Gallery,Edinburgh
Winter Salon, Timespan, Helmsdale
Land Radius, MFA Show, Cooper Gallery, Dundee
Landship, Public Art sculptural intervention, Dundee City Council, Dundee
2013
New Highland Graduates, Inverness Museum & Art Gallery, Inverness
Feat SBK, Äkkigalleria, Jyväskylä, Finland
2012
Cove, Beach Hut, North Light, Dunbar, East Lothian, Scotland
Cuan Uhibist/The Secret Sea, Taigh Chearsabhagh, North Uist
2011
Arteles Studios, Arteles Creative Center, 38490 Haukijarvi, Finland
Awards
2019
Artist-in-Residence Award Scottish Graduate School of Arts & Humanities
2018
Visiting Doctoral Research Award Scottish Graduate School of Arts & Humanities
2017
Creative Economies DTP Scholarship Scottish Graduate School of Arts & Humanities | AHRC
2015
Creative Scotland/CNES Visual Arts & Crafts Award
Connected Communities Bursary - Writer and Travel Grant
2012
Creative Scotland/CNES Visual Arts & Crafts Award
Selected artist, North Light, Dunbar
2011
Creative Scotland - Investment Programme 4 Talent Development
Stanley Smith (UK) Horticultural Trust - Research Grant
Residencies
2022
La Wayaka Desert Residency, Atacama Desert, Chile
2019
Kaipātiki Project Environment Centre, North Shore, Auckland, NZ
2017
Kunstverein Schwedt e.V., Galerie am Kietz, Schwedt/Oder, Germany
2015/16
DRAW International, Artist-in-residence Oct ‘15, Jun ‘16, France
2013
Outlandia, Glen Nevis, Fort William
2012
North Light, Dunbar
2011/12
Cuan Uhibist (Secret Sea), Taigh Chearsabhagh Museum & Art Centre, North Uist
2011
Arteles Creative Centre, Hahmajarventie 26, 38490 Haukijarvi, Finland
Collaborations | Commissions
2014
Collaborating Artist - Vancouver Biennale 'I Have a Dream' Global Art, Farming & Peace Project
Collaborating Artist - So much depends upon… Nil By Mouth, Crichton Carbon Trust, Edinburgh
Commissioned Artist - 'An fheadhainn tha laighe sàmhach', (They lie silent and still) Comann Eachdraigh Uibhist a Tuath (North Uist Historical Society) WW1 Project
2011/13
Commissioned Artist - 'Art and the Machair Project' for MachairLife+
Academic Papers
2016
Slow Residency In A Taskscape: The Haunting Process Of Critical Reflection And Creative Experimentation Whilst Living In The Same Place As The People And Things I Study, “Being In Place” Conference (PLaCEInternational/Dundee) 2016
The Monument Game (2016) (Memory, Identity and Landscape – Geographical Perspectives, DCU, Dublin, Republic of Ireland)
2015
Wall-Paper-Plant: Putting Agential Realism into Practice (‘Matter Matters’ Symposium, Leeds University/Land2);
2014
How I found my way to the written word through visual art, (IAWIS/AIERTI 2014, published Philosophy Study, Vol. 4, No. 7, 2014, David Publishing, New York)
Reading Landscape: The Deception of Simplicity [MFA thesis]
2011
Cognition: Mind and Terrain [BFA thesis]