„Diese Arbeit beschäftigt sich mit dem scheinbaren Widerspruch zwischen musealer und religiöser Bildbetrachtung und der Frage, welche Kriterien diesen zu Grunde liegen. Ausgangspunkt für diese Fragestellung stellt eine Debatte dar, die in Russland geführt wird. Dort wurden sämtliche Kirchen nach der Oktoberrevolution 1917 enteignet. Der Besitz ging an den Staat über, was zur Folge hatte, dass viele der ursprünglich sakralen Objekte und Bauten zerstört, umgenutzt oder an Museen übergeben wurden. Nach dem Ende des Kommunismus in Russland wurde die Frage nach der Rückgabe dieser Besitztümer häufig gestellt. Aber erst 2007 kam es zu konkreten Planungen zu einem Gesetz zur „Übergabe des in staatlichem oder städtischem Besitz befindlichen Eigentums religiöser Zweckbestimmung an die religiösen Organisationen“ von Seiten des Staates. Dieses Gesetz sollte den Kirchen des Landes eine rechtliche Grundlage für Restitutionsforderungen bieten. Zeitgleich fühlen sich russische Museen durch das Gesetz in ihrem Bestand und in ihrer Existenz bedroht.”
„Die Frage, wem man in einer solchen Auseinandersetzung Recht geben sollte, ist durchaus schwierig: den Museen, die Kulturgüter (wie Ikonen) schützen, oder den Kirchen, für die Bilder Instrumentarien darstellen, die eine aktive Rolle im kirchlichen Ritus spielen und auch genau für diesen Zweck hergestellt wurden? Es geht also um die Frage, ob man sakrale Objekte, Kultwerke also, als Kunstwerke behandeln darf beziehungsweise wie dies zu rechtfertigen ist. Um diese Frage zu klären, ist es nötig den grundsätzlichen Umgang mit Bildern beider Institutionen zu klären. Hieraus ergeben sich auch Fragestellungen für die westlichen Museen und ihren bisherigen Gültigkeitsanspruch.”
‘This work deals with the apparent contradiction between museum and religious image viewing and the question of which criteria underlie these. The starting point for this question is a debate that is taking place in Russia. There, all churches were expropriated after the October Revolution in 1917. The property was transferred to the state, which meant that many of the originally sacred objects and buildings were destroyed, repurposed or handed over to museums. After the end of communism in Russia, the question of returning these possessions was frequently raised. However, it was not until 2007 that concrete plans were made by the state for a law on the ‘transfer of state-owned or municipally-owned religious property to religious organisations’. This law was intended to provide the country's churches with a legal basis for restitution claims. At the same time, Russian museums feel that their existence is threatened by the law.’
‘The question of who should be given the right in such a dispute is a difficult one: the museums, which protect cultural assets (such as icons), or the churches, for which images are instruments that play an active role in the church rite and were produced precisely for this purpose? The question is therefore whether sacred objects, i.e. works of worship, may be treated as works of art and how this can be justified. In order to clarify this question, it is necessary to clarify the fundamental handling of images in both institutions. This also raises questions for Western museums and their current claim to validity.’
This paper provides a critical examination of ecological planning based on the continuities that it displays across seemingly disparate political projects and historical periods. In order to do so, it draws on the small rural valley of La Bizkaia in Navarre, Spain. It produces an environmental history of the valley through a detailed study of its hydro-forestry resources, periodising such history according to a materialist reading of its ‘metabolic regimes’. That is to say, through the particular configurations between the natural and social orders that dictate life in La Bizkaia.
Initially, the study introduces the valley’s natural characteristics and its property structure, laying the foundations upon which the rest of this paper sits. Subsequently, it undertakes a detailed investigation of Francoist interventions in the 1940s-60s; a massive monoculture of pine trees was planted by the Francoist Forestry Council, which radically undermined La Bizkaia’s natural systems and depopulated it. This paper thus analyses the planning logic behind this natural intervention which, borrowing a term from one of its draftsmen, is named ‘total planning’.
The thesis then explores contemporary management of the valley by the Government of Navarre, which has maintained ownership until this day, aligning its plans with the international protocols and standards characteristic of green capitalism. By looking at projects undertaken in the valley for nature conservation and climate change adaptation, which receive funding from the European Union, this research reveals the continuities between Francoist policies and green capitalism, and how both operate under the logic of Total Planning. Under this planning logic, they both fail to accommodate the unpredictability of political conflict and natural systems.
Planning thus serves as a lens to explore the political and epistemological dimensions of ecological thought, placing a materialist reading of a small case study into the broader context of contemporary ecological intervention.