I am an artist and researcher based in Scotland. My PhD by practice is concerned with communicating more-than-human time within Scotland's rainforest habitats and is supported by a SGSAH/AHRC Doctoral Training Partnership Award.​ I am supervised by Edinburgh College of Art and the School of Geosciences at Edinburgh College of Art and with further supervision from Glasgow School of Art.
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My research-led practice is concerned with how artistic methods can amplify and draw out multispecies timings within rainforest habitats in the UK, such as seasonal and migratory patterns, reforestation and conservation timescales, and how such patterns are negotiated by human actors working to conserve ecological relationships. I'm interested in ethical questions that arise from object-based conservation interventions, such as wildlife boxes, tree guards, nest installations and herbivore fencing, and how these conservation practices embody cross-species collaboration across diverging timescales.
My practice is informed by environmental humanities, place-based and multispecies approaches. I test theory through art-based fieldwork, sound recording, film, photography and site-responsive sculpture and attempt to articulate an art practice that is grounded in site histories, presents and futures, both culturally and ecologically.​
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Other Experiences
In 2023-2024, I co-convened the cross-college Edinburgh Environmental Humanities Network PhD Lab at the University of Edinburgh and reading group and I am a member of of the Humanimal Kind research network at Edinburgh College of Art. In 2023 I was one of SGSAH/British Council's Earth Scholars and attended the Oslo School of Environmental Humanities (OSEH) and Norwegian Researcher School in Environmental Humanities (NoRS-EH) PhD training: Planting the Environmental Humanities: Theories and Methods. I completed a Masters in Contemporary Art Practice (2020: Distinction) from Edinburgh College of Art and have exhibited works in the UK and Iceland.
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Contact: ellie.b.ballantine(at)gmail.com
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Education
PhD Art - Ongoing - Edinburgh College of Art
Project: Sensing the refuge: art-based approaches to multispecies temporalities and naturecultural relations in Britain’s rainforests
MA Contemporary Art Practice (distinction) | Edinburgh College of Art, University of Edinburgh
Painting | Leith School of Art
MA English | University of St Andrews
Selected Group Exhibitions and Talks
PhD Showcase, Edinburgh College of Art | 2023
Situated, Edinburgh College of Art | 2022
Torg, Korpúlfsstaðir, Iceland | 2021
Artist Talk - presenter | SÍM Visual Artists Residency Programme, Reykjavik, Iceland | 2021
SÍM Samband íslenskra myndlistarmanna, Korpúlfsstaðir, Iceland | 2021
Final, Not Over...Again, Unit 1 Gallery, London | 2021
Masters Degree Show, Edinburgh College of Art | 2020
RIFT, Edinburgh College of Art | 2019
IGNEOUS, Edinburgh College of Art | 2019
Salon des Refusés, Embassy Gallery, Edinburgh | 2019
The Salon, Embassy Gallery, Edinburgh | 2018
Summer Exhibition, Leith School of Art, Edinburgh | 2018
Still We Rise, The People's Film Club, London | 2018
Winter Exhibition, Leith School of Art, Edinburgh | 2017
Residencies
EEHN PhD Lab, group residency | Cove Park, Argyll | 2023
Artists Residency Programme | SÍM Samband íslenskra myndlistarmanna / The Association of Icelandic Visual Artists, Reykjavik, Iceland | 2021
Artist residency | SÍM Samband íslenskra myndlistarmanna / The Association of Icelandic Visual Artists, Reykjavik, Iceland | 2019
Awards
SGSAH (Scottish Graduate School for Arts and Humanities) AHRC Doctoral Training Partnership Scholarships | 2024
Douglas Bader Foundation Education Grant | 2023
Edinburgh Student Experience Grant | co-application with Edinburgh Environmental Humanities PhD Lab colleagues on collaborative residency to Cove Park, Argyll | 2023
Douglas Bader Foundation Education Grant | 2022
Creative Scotland Visual Artist and Craft Maker Award | 2021
Snowdon Trust Education Grant | 2019
Snowdon Trust Education Grant | 2018
Douglas Bader Foundation Education Grant | 2018
Training & Publications
Publication of paper in the sound art journal Row of Trees | ‘Arboreal Intimacies: vibrating bodies, sharing wounds, navigating across messy boundaries’ (focus: artistic approaches to navigating more-than-human temporalities) | 2024
Oslo School of Environmental Humanities (OSEH) and Norwegian Researcher School in Environmental Humanities (NoRS-EH) | PhD course in Planting the Environmental Humanities: Theories and Methods | 2023
SGSAH (Scottish Graduate School for the Arts and Humanities)/British Council Earth Scholarships training programme for the Environmental Humanities | 2023
Contributor to the 'Bioart Coven Manifesto', published in Occult Studies Vol. 2: Revolution! by Snake Hair Press! | 2021