Lessons from a Multispecies Studio: Ecological Understanding & Biophilia through Creative Reciprocity

A highly original book in which the author proposes an expanded field of aesthetics, guided by her philosophy and approach to working, through the ways that philosophy can be manifested in art.She demonstrates the depth and complexity that she brings to her work through a sustained and committed relationship to working with animals across multiple projects. The book tells real-world stories about the author’s creative encounters - with animals, plant life, mineral beings and forest ecosystems - in her Vancouver-based interspecies art practice, Animal Lover, and how they shifted her outlook on the Earth and all of life.Each chapter presents a weaving together of personal reflection, interdisciplinary research, critical thought and art methods.The threads converge on this main point: the need to move away from anthropocentrism and towards ecological understanding, reciprocity and biophilia.The local journeys in each chapter are guided by more-than-human ways of knowing which provide an e