The Art of Action

A group of people lying on a college campus quad might not seem like anything out of the ordinary, but this spring, this act of gathering will double as a catalyst for environmental and social change.

Artists, environmentalists, students, and members of the public will use their bodies to spell out “Transición Justa Ahora” and “Just Transition Now” at USC’s McCarthy Quad on March 1 as part of El Respiro/Respire, a participatory performance and event developed by artist Carolina Caycedo. For more than a decade, Caycedo has examined the negative impacts of extractive development on local communities and ecologies from a place of joy and abundance that uplifts communities and activists who are deeply engaged in solutions to the climate and energy crisis. She calls performances like El Respiro/Respire “geochoreographies,” with each of these collaborative actions placing people in the natural environment to spotlight harmful human changes to the land and mobilize toward a fair energy future. The call for a “just transition now” advocates for a shift to clean energy that centers both environmental sustainability and social justice, ensuring a better future for all.

The performance marks the conclusion of the Vincent Price Art Museum’s PST ART exhibition We Place Life at the Center/Situamos la vida en el centro, which features the work of Caycedo and other artists and environmental movements promoting alternative solutions to the global climate crisis. “We Place Life at the Center is so much more than an exhibition; it is a research framework, educational platform, and community gathering project designed to build bridges among different social movements and environmental organizations that are leading transition efforts throughout the Western Hemisphere,” says curator Joseph Valencia. “We envision El Respiro/Respire as the culmination of this project, where we can gather participants and the public to reflect on the importance of protecting the vibrant lands, waters, and ecologies that bind us.”

In this spirit of collaboration and solidarity, Caycedo will hold a panel discussion on El Respiro/Respire prior to the performance (both are free and open to the public with RSVP) with experts from Latin America and Los Angeles, including PST ART research advisors Camila Marambio and Barbara Santos and USC Wrigley Institute for Environment and Sustainability curator Allison Agsten. “Behind each of Carolina’s objects and performances are countless deep engagements with her collaborators across Latin America, centering the people whose lived experiences often go unseen and unheard,” says Agsten. “Her work vibrates with that ethic, standing apart from so many others who address the impacts of destruction of environments and the systems that allow that destruction, but who often do not meaningfully look further to solutions and to the power of relationships and community.”

We Place Life at the Center is just one of many PST ART: Art & Science Collide exhibitions and programs across Southern California that are taking a closer look at some of the most pressing environmental and social issues of our time. Artists, environmentalists, scientists, and others (including a majority of participating organizations conducting climate impact reports related to their exhibitions) offer real-world solutions that seek to reframe our relationship to nature, promote ecological restoration, and inspire us all to build a more sustainable, collective future.

For a Healthier Planet: 100 Oak Trees, Cloud Prototypes, and Homemade Topsoil

Helen and Newton Harrison: California Work

La Jolla Historical Society, California Center for the Arts, Escondido, and San Diego Central Library
Through January 19, 2025

Potted citrus trees, homemade topsoil filled with thousands of red worms, and an imagined transformation of a debris basin into a verdant recreational area are among the innovative ways that husband-and-wife team Newton and Helen Mayer Harrison responded to growing environmental concerns in the 1960s and beyond. The two were some of the earliest pioneers of the ecological art movement and agreed they would only take on projects that benefited the ecosystem. Several of these developed in California between the late 1960s and 2000s are on view in a multipart retrospective showcasing restaged performance artworks, large-scale installations, and unrealized proposals for real-world environmental solutions that explore complex ecologies, the impacts of overexploitation of natural resources, and global climate change.

Transformative Currents: Art and Action in the Pacific Ocean

Oceanside Museum of Art
Through February 9, 2025

Covering nearly one-third of the Earth’s surface, the Pacific Ocean is home to thousands of interconnected peoples, species, and ecosystems—all under threat from climate change, industrial pollution, and overfishing. Works by contemporary artists and collaborative teams focused on the theme of ocean currents—which suggest fluidity, interconnectivity, and collective responsibility—address some of these issues to highlight the interdependency of resources and the impact of local actions on global problems. From immersive video installations demonstrating the threats of rising sea levels to living sculptures that replant sea vegetation, the works in this multipart exhibition harness art’s potential to enact positive ecological change, both planetary and local.  

Seeing the Unseeable: Data, Design, Art

ArtCenter College of Design
Through February 15, 2025

Big data is everywhere. This exhibition brings it into focus through its impact on art, design, culture, and daily life across works by artists and designers at the forefront of data visualization. Artworks are categorized into concepts including data humanism, invisible data, and data environments. The last expresses concern for Earth’s current state and climate through pieces like a massive titanium cloud prototype based on the study of weather systems and compilations of numerical data from thunderclouds; AI data paintings that revisualize humans’ experiences of nature; and crochet simulations of coral reef ecosystems threatened by natural and human causes.  

Sinks: Places We Call Home

Self Help Graphics & Art, presented at Luckman Art Gallery at Cal State LA
Through February 15, 2025

Sinks: Places We Call Home brings to light the environmental injustices faced by communities of color near two manufacturing sites in LA: the Exide battery recycling plant in Vernon and the former Athens Tank Farm (ExxonMobil Oil Corporation) in Willowbrook. Artists Beatriz Jaramillo and Maru García use data-driven research and community collaboration to expose the long-term impacts of industrial waste and contamination from these sites through soil testing, lead reduction studies, and conversations with residents. The exhibition seeks to interrogate a history of government negligence, elevate the voices and stories of the people from these neighborhoods, and work toward alternative solutions that reframe our relationship with the land through knowledge, stewardship, and advocacy.

From the Ground Up: Nurturing Diversity in Hostile Environments

Armory Center for the Arts
Through February 23, 2025

What can seeds tell us about the future? From the Ground Up looks to the regenerative nature of seeds for inspiration and guidance on how to navigate current and coming hostile environments. The works on view blend ancient and contemporary technologies, precolonial understandings of nature, and histories of contested spaces to propose sustainable futures where technology and nature coexist. Artist Beatriz Cortez’s Generosity I sculpture, for example, carries seeds important to Mesoamerican Indigenous peoples into an imagined future. “The seeds…evoke the technological advances and the knowledge of ancient peoples sent across time for all of us to survive in the present and for others to survive in the future,” Cortez said of the work in an interview with Monument Lab.

World Without End: The George Washington Carver Project

California African American Museum
Through March 2, 2025

This show explores the life and legacy of George Washington Carver (1864–1943), a pioneer of sustainable agriculture and plant-based engineering whose then radical ideas, like organic fertilizers and crop rotation, are now recognized as staples of modern conservation. Visitors can get a close-up look at Carver’s rarely seen artworks and personal artifacts spanning weavings, still lifes made with peanut- and clay-derived dyes and paints, lab equipment, and notebooks. The exhibition also features contemporary artists, scientists, and engineers working in dialogue with Carver and his interests in nature, biology, activism, and sustainability, amplifying the enduring influence of his career.

Social Forest: Oaks of Tovaangar

The Broad
Through April 6, 2025

Social Forest: Oaks of Tovaangar brings new life to Joseph Beuys’s influential project 7000 Eichen (7000 Oaks), which involved planting 7,000 trees accompanied by stone markers throughout Kassel, Germany, to collectively reckon with the traumas of World War II. In collaboration with Tongva leaders, the Gabrielino-Tongva Springs Foundation, and local nonprofit North East Trees, The Broad is planting 100 native oaks in Elysian Park and five at the sacred Tongva site Kuruvungna Village Springs in West LA. The project centers ecological restoration, nurtures Tongva culture and history, and confronts historical trauma, highlighting how we can nurture both nature and community. An outdoor celebration on February 8 will kick off the first day of planting at Elysian Park with nature-based workshops and activities led by Tongva artists and educators and local environmental groups.

Reframing Dioramas: The Art of Preserving Wilderness

Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County
Through September 15, 2025

The Natural History Museum’s beloved taxidermy dioramas got a glow up in celebration of their 100th anniversary this year. Unveiling a newly restored diorama hall that’s been closed for decades, the museum has added installations that explore dioramas as a unique combination of art, science, and technology melding biodiversity, ecology, conservation, colonialism, and changing museum display techniques. Three specially commissioned dioramas meditate on the future of LA’s ecosystems across an apocalyptic landscape of glass, crystal, and metal; in a fantastical imagining of California’s biomes inhabited by alebrijes (fantastical Mexican folk art sculptures); and through digital projections that track the effects of development along the LA River.