Conceptualising Art Education as Environmental Activism in Preservice Teacher Education

This article explores how art and design education can contribute to the imperative of climate change and help societies adapt to living more sustainably. Drawing on methods from arts-based research and qualitative case study, it reports on an investigation into what can be learned from creating environmental art installations with preservice teachers (those training to be K-12 teachers), as part of an environmental art education programme in a leading Canadian university. Findings support that preservice teachers experienced behavioural and attitudinal shifts towards sustainability after engaging in the processes of creating environmental art; involvement in the programme also provided opportunities for building community, engaging multiple domains of learning, modelling sustainable art-making practices and prompting environmental activism. The results of this study inform a developing pedagogy for environmental art education in higher education settings.