Art and the Environment in Southeast Asia: Making in a Changing World
Discover how Southeast Asian artists respond to environmental change through creative practices rooted in community and place.
Duration
5 weeksWeekly study
1 hour
Art and the Environment in Southeast Asia: Making in a Changing World
This course has been certified by the CPD Certification Service as conforming to continuing professional development principles. Find out more.
Explore how art shapes environmental understanding in Southeast Asia
Artists in Southeast Asia are responding to urgent environmental and social shifts with innovative approaches that connect place, material, and community. This course offers a thematic journey into the ways contemporary art practices illuminate and address ecological challenges.
You’ll discover how artists use creativity to spark conversations about sustainability, environmental justice, and our relationship with the natural world - exploring work that’s both beautiful and deeply meaningful.
Creative responses to environmental change and community
Discover how artists navigate the complex relationships between nature, urbanisation, and communities. You’ll see how art fosters dialogue around sustainability and resilience through diverse media and methods, from traditional craft to cutting-edge installations.
Materiality and ecological practice: telling environmental stories
Learn how artists select and repurpose materials to tell stories of environmental transformation and human impact. You’ll explore how they blend traditional craft with contemporary concerns, creating work that speaks to both cultural heritage and pressing ecological issues.
Art, society, and ecological realities in Southeast Asia
Explore case studies that show how artistic practices engage with the socio-political and cultural dimensions of environmental change. You’ll see how art encourages reflection and collective action, bridging communities and sparking conversations about our shared environmental future.
Throughout the course, you’ll gain insight into the vibrant contemporary art scene in Southeast Asia and understand how creative practices can shape the way we think about and respond to environmental challenges.
Syllabus
Week 1
Welcome to the course!
Introduction
This section gives you an overview of the course. Let's start by meeting the team and artist, and getting to know other learners!
Week 2
Changing Constants
Changing Constants
This week, we will explore how artists Sharon Chin and Art Labor navigate the complex entanglements between changing environment and their communities.
Week 3
How Things Meet
How Things Meet
In this section, we will gain insight into how changing urban and natural landscapes have shaped artist Sopheap Pich’s practice and material selection.
Week 4
In Our Backyard
In Our Backyard
This week, we will uncover day-to-day ecological encounters of artists Robert Zhao and Sharon Chin, delving into impacts of human activities towards non-human inhabitants co-existing in the same space.
Week 5
Where do we go from here?
Conclusion
This week, we will reflect on what we learned over the past few weeks, we also invite you to consider how environment is not a distant ideal but a lived, complex reality—difficult to define, yet vital to how we understand our worl
Who is this accredited by?
The CPD Certification Service was established in 1996 and is the leading independent CPD accreditation institution operating across industry sectors to complement the CPD policies of professional and academic bodies.
When would you like to start?
Start straight away and join a global classroom of learners. If the course hasn’t started yet you’ll see the future date listed below.
Available now
Learning on this course
On every step of the course you can meet other learners, share your ideas and join in with active discussions in the comments.
What will you achieve?
By the end of the course, you‘ll be able to...
- Gain a deeper understanding of how contemporary Southeast Asian artists engage with socio-environmental issues around them.
- Develop skills to critically analyse artworks within their cultural and ecological contexts.
- Encounter art and ways of thinking from Southeast Asia.
- Apply vocabulary and visual analysis strategies to form an interpretation of artworks.
Who is the course for?
This course is ideal for art enthusiasts, environmental scholars, cultural researchers, and anyone eager to understand the intersection of art and environmental issues in Southeast Asia and beyond.
Who will you learn with?
Goh Sze Ying is a curator at National Gallery Singapore, where she contributes to the research and exhibitions of modern art in Southeast Asia.
Teo Hui Min is Curator at National Gallery Singapore where she conceives and realises exhibitions and research relating to modern art in Southeast Asia.
Jying Tan is Senior Manager (Curatorial Programmes) at National Gallery Singapore, where she contributes to growing youth audience in museums through various pedagogical and inclusive engagement.
Rose Wei co-runs an independent publishing studio focused on risography and artist books, exploring the social, cultural, and political dimensions of transnational experiences.
Who developed the course?
National Gallery Singapore
National Gallery Singapore is a visual arts museum that oversees the world’s largest public collection of Singapore and Southeast Asian modern art, creating dialogues between the art of the region and the world.
Learning on FutureLearn
Your learning, your rules
- Courses are split into weeks, activities, and steps to help you keep track of your learning
- Learn through a mix of bite-sized videos, long- and short-form articles, audio, and practical activities
- Stay motivated by using the Progress page to keep track of your step completion and assessment scores
Join a global classroom
- Experience the power of social learning, and get inspired by an international network of learners
- Share ideas with your peers and course educators on every step of the course
- Join the conversation by reading, @ing, liking, bookmarking, and replying to comments from others
Map your progress
- As you work through the course, use notifications and the Progress page to guide your learning
- Whenever you’re ready, mark each step as complete, you’re in control
- Complete 90% of course steps and all of the assessments to earn your certificate
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