American Art and the Pyrocene

Coined by historian Stephen Pyne in 2015, the concept of Pyrocene defines a human-caused fire age in which burning has become synonymous both with fossil energy consumption and lasting environmental damage. In North America, fire has long stood at an ecological, cultural, and political threshold, particularly when considering the long history of Indigenous practices such as controlled burns. With the arrival of Euro-American settlers, fire became a weapon used against Native societies to ensure an unbridled exploitation of natural resources. In turn, the omnipresence of fire within the US colonial project inspired a full-fledged artistic genre as of the early 19^th century, and depictions of landscapes set alight became a popular form of disaster spectacle. Fire, however, has acquired new meaning in the 21^st century: faced with persistent drought and large-scale blazes exacerbated by climate change, a growing number of communities are, for instance, reconsidering prescribed burns as an ecological practice.

Examining interactions between American art and the Pyrocene across time and media, this session invites submissions from researchers, scholars, and artists at all levels who focus on:

• Visual representations of fire in American Art, from the 18^th century to the present
• Material interactions between American art and fire (accidental or intentional destruction, fire as creative fuel or co-participant in artmaking...)
• Artistic involvement in the study of fire and fire management
• Artist-led environmental interventions involving fire
• Artistic approaches to Indigenous ecologies of fire in North America
• Artists’ responses to North American wildfires and the climate crisis in our time