Swiss Institute’s ‘Spora’ Initiative Tackles Climate Change

Art alone cannot be our savior, and this poses a challenge for climate change-focused art. As I walked the streets of Lower Manhattan, I could sense the smoke and smell the fires that ravaged Canadian forests thousands of miles away, amid my visits to art galleries. In the face of what could be the hottest summer on record, I couldn’t help but wonder: How does one appreciate art when the world feels like it’s on fire?

The exhibition “Spora” at the Swiss Institute in Greenwich Village goes beyond being a typical art show; it is an intervention. Co-curated by Alison Coplan, the project remains open-ended, with new works and artists continuously joining the initial group of five artists.

Occupying the institute’s “non-gallery spaces,” such as hallways, stairwells, and the roof, “Spora” takes a slow and provisional approach. It may be easily overlooked at times, but it earnestly addresses the climate crisis. Remarkably, it still manages to succeed as art.

Among the various visual experiences, a few captivate viewers like bees to flowers. Notably, Vivian Suter’s untitled wall mural (2023) is composed of vibrant orange spheres against a green-yellow background, illuminating the museum’s rooftop and catching the eye from several blocks away.

Inside the museum, a framed Mary Manning photo-collage from 2023 titled “And all the lives we ever lived and all the lives to be are full of trees and changing leaves (for Jenni)” delivers a visually striking moment. It showcases a large image of autumnal maple trees, hanging beside a series of vertical painted stripes in a stairway.

These painted stripes, found throughout the building, result from an instruction piece by conceptual artist Helen Mirra. Mirra’s directive dictates that all repainting and touching-up of the once-white walls must now use leftover mixed paint. This work illuminates the ongoing use of paint and the labor associated with painting by museum workers. It represents one of the two pieces in the exhibition that embody the concept of “maintenance art” coined by Mierle Laderman Ukeles, the former artist in residence at the New York City Department of Sanitation.

Reflecting on Manning’s photos alongside Mirra’s lines, I realized that Manning’s seemingly non-ecological images are, in fact, depictions of a hyperlocal environment. The sunlight filtering through the yellowed leaves of a tree resonates with the stained glass windows depicted in smaller images within Manning’s collage. Manning’s work, explicitly urban in nature, brings a heightened awareness to the environment just outside the gallery doors.

While the visual allure of “Spora” largely lies within the artworks themselves, the museum reveals itself as a bustling hive of activity. On the rooftop, Finnish artist Jenna Sutela has constructed “Vermi-Sibyl” (2023), a sculpture-compost bin resembling an oversized gazing ball found in gardens, filled with approximately 1,000 worms. This gleaming chrome structure, powered by an “earth battery” fueled by organic decomposition, speaks with a voice adapted from Marjory the Trash Heap, a character from Jim Henson’s 1980s TV series “Fraggle Rock.” It is regularly fed with food scraps collected from the Swiss Institute’s staff, while environmental factors affect the sounds it emits through temperature, humidity, and bioelectrical activity resulting from the composting process.

Similarly inconspicuous, a glass-fronted refrigerator at the top of a stairway holds transparent bags containing mushroom spores and sawdust. These materials will be used by Indigenous artist and ethnobotanist T’uy’t’tanat-Cease Wyss for a forthcoming sculptural work titled “wa lúlem ta ts’áytens tl’a stéwa ḵin (The mushrooms are singing).” The sculpture promises to incorporate “biosonic synthesizers” and may involve a carved elm log.

Under different circumstances, the unfinished qualities of these installations might be considered shortcomings. However, within the context of “Spora,” they offer a glimpse into an ongoing experiment—a testament to the Swiss Institute’s continuous effort and invitation to explore new ideas, with future artworks still in development.

During my conversation with Stefanie Hessler, the director of the Swiss Institute, she referred to the concept of “ecological institutional critique.” This adaptation of the phrase, previously applied to conceptual artists of the late 1960s like Hans Haacke, showcases how museums, as institutions, become the subject of their own art by examining ideology and power structures. Hessler, alongside Coplan, the senior curator and head of programs, organized “Spora.” Nevertheless, the question remains: Can institutions truly undertake this critical self-analysis?

In response to this question, the institute provided me with extensive spreadsheets documenting energy audits, energy consumption, shipping expenses, and individual airline flights dating back to 2019. The spreadsheets even indicated whether the travel was in first-class or coach, all tracked using the Gallery Climate Coalition’s calculator application to measure the institute’s carbon footprint. Notably, the data showed a reduction of 44 tCO2e (metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent) from 2019 to 2022.

This comprehensive exploration of the institute’s climate impact is admirable. “Spora” consistently urges viewers to consider systems—how museums exist within the context of cities and how they serve as workplaces for both artists and museum staff.

However, what would a broader evaluation of the art world ecosystem entail? How can we address the environmental impact of international art fairs, global mega-galleries, auction houses, and art storage facilities? Moreover, who will be able to persuade the billionaire collector class to minimize their use of private jets?

Spora

Through May 10, 2025, Swiss Institute, 38 St. Marks Place, Manhattan, (212) 925-2035; swissinstitute.net.