In The Balance: Art For A Changing World

Honestly, I'm kind of sceptical about this sort of thing. Putting on a show about environmental crises at the MCA is comparable to putting out a zine about being shy and liking cupcakes. It's not even preaching to the converted — the difference between audience and author opinion is so potentially slight as to make it akin to talking to oneself. To some extent, In The Balance conforms to that expectation, with a goodly amount of preaching about recycling and how long a plastic container takes to degrade (no, really?). As well as more than a few documentations of environmental protests — admittedly in relatively effective contexts like the Tasmanian old growth fracas — encompassing your typical banner waving and cops/pigs witticisms. But it's a credit to the show's curation that these elements don't so much grate as form a framework of expected reactions upon which a lot of arguably more interesting works create nuance.

Much of In The Balance is quite spectacular, with a good deal of excellent photography covering both verdant and destroyed landscapes, alongside numerous plant installations which lend each room a beauty and liveliness. This serves to open the mind to the show's concerns via aesthetic appreciation rather than duh-duh sloganeering. Perhaps the most vibrant example being Lauren Berkowitz's plastic bag sculpture, which drapes from the ceiling white, quiet and enveloping. You (or maybe I) can't help but want to spend time with this, and an appreciation of it utilises a different part of the brain than that which is normally hostile to environmental engagement via it's association with cockweed environmentalists. Whether this results in any action is up for debate, but that it involves thought potentially outside a viewer's usual pathways with regards to "the environment" makes In The Balance a compelling experience.