Mesozoaires (Research revue of École Supérieure d'Art d'Aix en Provence) N° 2 "Art, Agriculture et Biodiversité" (Projeto Entre Serras _ Creative Europe)

This issue of Cahiers Mésozoaires attempts to build bridges between art, agriculture, and biodiversity. The texts it contains seek to reexamine our relationship with geography, geology, society, and politics, and above all our attitude towards living things, our relationship with the planet and the biosphere, and to question the ecosystems we want for tomorrow.
Since 2015, this field of study has been explored in depth in the teaching methods of ÉsaAix and in the research and creative activities of its Locus Sonus Vitae laboratory, notably through the artistic walks organized with the school's teams in the Aix region, the Walking the Data-Plot Map and Acoustic Commons projects, and the La recherche par l'écoute (Research through Listening) program. This area of expertise includes the Entre
Serras Project (PES_CE) supported by Creative Europe, the European Commission's Culture Program. The PES aims to create a network of contemporary art in rural areas, more specifically in mountain regions, by offering, together with artists and various audiences, experiences and research that bring together inclusive and holistic visions in a dialogue between diverse worlds aimed at uniting art, agriculture, and biodiversity. 

The thematic days (Art, Agriculture, and Biodiversity) on December 2 and 3, 2024, were the starting point for the proposals brought together in these notebooks. They took place ahead of the Malpartida de Cáceres seminar, organized by the Vostell Museum and the municipality of Malpartida in Spain on March 27 and 28, 2025 (Art, Life, and Networked Landscapes), and following the Castelo Branco seminar (Art, Tourism, and Landscape) in Portugal. It is with this shared research-creation perspective in mind that artists, researchers, professionals from the worlds of art and agriculture, and citizen associations are coming together.

Three publications conclude Projeto Entre Serras _ Creative Europe (PES_CE), which is supported by eight partners from France, Spain, and Portugal, and is funded by Creative Europe, the European Commission’s Culture Programme:

1      Mesozoaires, by Aix-en-Provence art school, recherche revue N°2 « Art, Agriculture and Biodiversity » (French).   

2      Memory book of Projeto Entre Serras _ Creative Europe by Instituto Politecnico de Lisboa (English

3      Museo Vostell Malpartida de Cáceres, Exhibition catalogue (Spanish and English)
Projeto Entre Serras is a contemporary art network focused on agriculture and biodiversity. The project aims to create a psychogeographical artistic network across the mountain regions of Portugal, Spain, and France. Mountains are naturally areas of low population density; their geography makes them difficult to inhabit and unsuitable for intensive agriculture. They therefore remain living laboratories where wild and domestic natures are questioned, shaped by the blurred boundaries between urban and rural worlds.