“Struggling in the Ecosystem,” an interactive installation which ran from March to April 30 in the SP/N Gallery, draws connections between issues in the environment and how humans interact with it. Created by Hadi Asgharpour, MFA student and BAHT graduate teaching associate, the works initially stemmed from his changing interactions with nature, starting with his childhood in Northern Iran.
“We have a small city, Kiashahr, it’s very unique,” Asgharpour said. “It has everything: rivers, [the] Caspian Sea, forests, plains, wetlands. When I was a child, everything was beautiful, but during the past decades, everything has changed.”
His childhood memories serving as a catalyst for what came forth in his art, Asgharpour distinctly remembers the time the wetlands were dried to build a harbor that became too shallow to receive ships or boats. With the construction causing the loss of nature and birds that had once existed there, he sought connections between his art and the nature he once knew, and represents this in the gallery with a boat that hangs from the ceiling.
“When I was a child, I used to go to that wetland with my father and row our boat, so I used that boat as a metaphor for my artwork,” Asgharpour said. “I use art to show what has happened to that wetland, [creating] feeling and also grief for what has been lost in the environment.”
Despite becoming an engineer in Iran, he was always interested in art. His sister, involved in painting, today serves as the biggest inspiration for his growth as an artist, propelling him beyond pursuing art only as a hobby.
“I wanted to become an artist, but back home everyone is looking to become an engineer — being in science,” Asgharpour said. “That was my biggest moment of my life to transfer from engineering to becoming an artist.”
When Asgharpour made his way to the U.S. in 2022, he found similar issues related to the environment at UTD: where there was once untouched land, soon there were plans for buildings such as the esports center, with trees to be removed for its construction marked with X’s. Knowing the trees, too, would be taken away, the idea for the gallery came to him.
“I started brainstorming [this] project to create a conversation between human and non-human,” Asgharpour said. “The trees [are] trying to talk and communicate with us. If you go outside, close to [a] tree and [talk], the tree wouldn’t distract us, it [is] just something beautiful. But I try to create something that can distract conversation, and it can say ‘I can be a part of it.’”
Many of the gallery’s elements utilize interactive displays. Branches of real trees move as a viewer comes close to the display, using motors and sensors which detect human presence. It is this very connection between human and art in which Asgharpour finds life coursing through his display.
“I try to bring interactivity in my work, so the audience becomes a part of the art,” Asgharpour said. “Their presence matters; they become a part of the piece and [perform] with it.”
Beyond the moving branches, Asgharpour incorporates sound and reflection, namely in a Plexiglass display boat with oars rotating in circular motions with sound. When viewers come close the boat, they see their blurred reflection, a call for internal reflection. According to Asgharpour, the piece focuses on the absence of water in Guilan, Iran and the disappearing traditional fishing practices that come with modern technology, while “confronting them with their own presence in the scene.” To him, it is the details of art that allow him to weave connections and metaphors.
“You usually expect to see a boat on the floor, or on water, why is [the] boat on the ceiling?” Asgharpour said. “I put the boat on the ceiling and [audiences can ask] why and think differently.”
In his work, one concept stands out: a simultaneous connection between solace and nostalgia, known as solastalgia. A theory coined by Australian environmentalist Glenn Albrecht, to Asgharpour, the concept creates a connection between the grief he feels toward the environment while allowing audiences to feel their own grief at what is lost in the outside world.
“It is about distress and environmental loss,” Asgharpour said. “I try to use art to bring meaning and narrative to [audiences] who come to my gallery.”
Asgharpour’s knowledge and inspiration come from many different sources. He finds both on-site expeditions and conversations with his students teach him about nature.
“I was in a forest and I knew at least two [to] four trees [were] cut,” Asgharpour said. “But when you see the satellite image, everything looks the same, [when] it’s not.”
xtine burrough, BAHT professor, creative director of LabSynthE and Asgharpour’s project supervisor, said that art and technology can be seen as a growing field.
“We are always asking our MFA students how technology is incorporated into their artworks and sometimes it is obvious that it is incorporated materialistically [like] the way Hadi’s work is represented,” burrough said. “Sometimes it is about how digital technologies have affected our sensibilities, [and] there are different ways that art and technology are related and entangled. We look for that, we strive for that.”
While the gallery represents loss and subtle hope, a multitude of other emotions are hidden within it for the viewer to discover. burrough found her own emotions transformed throughout the gallery beyond that sense of loss.
“I also think there’s a way in which the trees are very playful, [creating] a bit of a counterbalance [while creating] a space where you can have some lightness and optimism,” burrough said.
Asgharpour said he hopes to obtain a Ph.D. in the future and work with like-minded individuals, such as scientists, to expand his work. He seeks to translate natural science data into artwork to make it understandable for a larger audience.
“We see graphs and diagrams [talking about the environment], but it is outside of human perception,” Asgharpour said. “We need art as a tool — as a catalyst — to help us make it graspable for humans and see what is happening.”
