Sustainability Through Art

Wrap your head around this.

Art VULUPS (Art as a Vehicle to Understand Land Use and Sustainability) is a project that was spurred by the Inland Empire Section of the American Planning Association (APA) and various community based organizations and non-profits throughout Southern California.

The idea started with the desire of urban planners to promote sustainable land use to the community in a non-academic way. In a progressive leap, they decided to harness the power of art and dialogue by asking artists to create works based on the topics they most wished to convey information about to the public.

These topics include things like land use, housing, noise, healthy communities and transportation. Seems like a smart idea to use the vehicle of creativity and art to make people stop, ponder and think and then engage in important conversations about what this all means in our common environments.

It’s a lofty concept and ambitious project for sure, but admirable in its motivation to connect the urban planning process with real people and to teach them about the sustainable ways of the future that will benefit all.

What’s even cooler is that the art projects created will be kept as a public art collection called the Collaborative 1.0 Collection that will rove as a traveling exhibition in various cities until they are offered up for bid later this year at an APA conference in Santa Barbara.

This Thursday, April 7 from 5 to 9 p.m. the exhibit of current work will be presented to the public at the Garden of El Paseo. The evening will also include literary interpretations of the exhibit by leading local poets. It is a free, educational public event.

More information about the project can be found online.