If humanity is now the dominant influence on the ecology of our planet, then aiming for Net Zero and low impact is not sufficient; we need to imagine ways in which we can redesign our civilisation to have a dramatically positive impact on biodiversity and move towards an age of ecological abundance. This is the focus of the concept of the Biodiversity Fingerprint.
We ask the following questions to provoke consideration of this idea:
Can we imagine ways to create ecological abundance through our actions?
Can we redesign our managed systems in ways that help biodiversity to flourish?
How do our food, clothing, resource use, waste, and built environment connect us to other living things — and how can they support biodiversity?
What does it look like when human activities have a positive impact on biodiversity?
The Concept: Biodiversity Fingerprint
In response to the prevalent concept of the ‘Carbon Footprint’ and its corollary, the Biodiversity Footprint, we conceive a progressive approach that focuses on the immense potential for human beings to have a positive impact on biodiversity and our planet’s ecology. Whereas the ‘Carbon Footprint’ focuses on our unintentional negative impact, the Biodiversity Fingerprint focuses on the potential for intentional positive impact.
If we do not have awareness of the potential for positive ecological impact, and only emphasise our negative impact, then human beings are conceived of as inherently damaging to our planet, and the focus can only be turned towards minimising damage.
If we are in the age of the Anthropocene, then low negative impact is not a sufficient aim. We must have a dramatically positive impact, so as to change course from ecological catastrophe.
The Biodiversity Fingerprint is a concept created to raise awareness of the enormous potential human beings have for creating a positive impact on biodiversity and ecological resilience. There are many examples from human cultures throughout the world and throughout history of this phenomenal potential, such as: the development of the Great Plains; the creation of self-sustaining oases across the Middle East; homegardens increasing rainforest biodiversity in Southeast Asia; or the Loess Plateau rehabilitation programme. We need to learn from examples like these, apply the wealth of contemporary scientific knowledge, and harness the power of the human imagination to redesign our civilisation to create ecological abundance.
People ask, “What is the carbon footprint of a person, company, or country?” Instead, we should also be asking, “What is the biodiversity fingerprint of a person, company, or country?” “What are we doing to increase biodiversity, and what are the results?” This can be measured and tracked over time in ways comparable to a ‘Carbon Footprint’.
The fingerprint is opposed to the footprint as the mark left by our hands—of our intentional action—in front of our line of vision, rather than behind it. The fingerprint is also a distinctive mark of our identity; it uniquely identifies us. What we do in life identifies who we are as people. The Biodiversity Fingerprint focuses our attention on what we are doing to create ecological abundance. It can become an expression of our identity in relation to other living things.
With reflection on the very structure of our being, the concept of the Biodiversity Fingerprint can develop thinking about our identity and the web of life further.
We can think of biodiversity as being integral to our identity in three ways:
Connection: We are genetically related to every other living thing.
Dependence: We are dependent on the myriad species in the web of life for our breathable air, fresh water, food, clothing, protection from disease, hospitable climate, and the beauty of the world we want to live in.
Co-existence: We exist together with other species at this time, in a very particular set of ecological and climatic conditions, that make our biological forms of life functional and feasible.
The Biodiversity Fingerprint Commission
In 2024, Proposition created an Open Call for artistic responses to the Biodiversity Fingerprint. Katie Bret-Day and William Joshua Templeton were selected to create new artworks which responded to this concept.
Katie and William were selected from 105 artists who applied to the Open Call. Following the selection process, they began a Research and Development residency. This included receiving tuition from Satish Kumar (Founder of Schumacher College and previously Editor of Resurgence & Ecologist magazine for over 40 years), Colin Tudge (real food campaigner and science writer, author of The Secret Life of Trees), Martha Lewis (Head of Materials at Henning Larsen Architects), and Proposition Co-founder Daniel J Hudson.
The commissioned artists also visited Professor Martin Wolfe’s Wakelyns Agroforestry Research Centre and Martin Crawford’s Forest Garden - two outstanding examples of increasing biodiversity through farming. Curatorial guidance throughout the six week residency came from Alice Black - who sits on the Mayor of London’s Cultural advisory board, is Governor of the Museum of London, and is Proposition’s in-house artistic advisor.
Katie-Bret Day’s monumental piece was mounted on the external wall of Proposition Camden, facing the iconic Roundhouse. The banner displaying her artwork had a good Biodiversity Fingerprint. The textile used was created by removing waste plastic from the environment and spinning it into yarn, which was then woven into rPET textile. The inks used were certified with the OEKO-TEX® ECO PASSPORT. A gutter was installed to divert rainwater runoff away from drains, preventing microparticles from entering rivers and eventually the ocean. Lighting for the banner was kept below 2200 Kelvin and directed away from the sky to minimise disturbance to birds. At the end of the banner's life, Proposition plans to have the rPET textile melted down and cast into the mould of a beehive, which will house bees on the roof of the building and support pollination.
Katie Bret-Day explained:
“I wanted to represent the complex interdependence and collaboration between human and non human subjects, to think of us as a collective body within a galaxy. I hope that considering this entanglement will help us better protect and encourage ecological abundance.”
“It has been a huge privilege to be part of this commission. I have had opportunities to learn about biodiversity in many forms, from philosophy to farms. This has given me a broader understanding of what this phrase really means and how these ideas can be put into practice. It is a huge challenge to represent such vast ideas and beings but I hope that the imagery makes people look and engage with some of the real world examples I have learnt from.”
William Joshua Templeton said:
"My mission is to unwind/undo the negative human impact on the environment, by sharing positive stories that help us realise we’re all part of this beautiful ecosystem and not apart from it.”
About the Artists
Katie Bret-Day is a London-based artist who uses the viscous materiality of photography to explore the contingent and discursive nature of being. Spanning the contexts of posthuman and connected ecology, Bret-Day’s research explores the amalgamation of digital and physical bodies using alternative methods of image capture, interventions and printing.
Bret-Day’s interests sit at the intersection of the arts and sciences. She uses the medium of photography as an expanded practice, to represent scientific findings, research and philosophical concepts.
In 2018, Bret-Day was nominated as one of five rising talents by the Guardian and her work was included in the Tate commissioned Photography Ideas Book (2019) and subsequently acquired by the British Library. In 2018 as well, she received Creative Review’s Zeitgeist Award in 2018.
Katie Bret-Day graduated from the Royal College of Art in 2020 with distinction and holds a First Class degree from the London College of Communication UAL.
@KatieBretDay // https://katiebretday.cargo.site
William Templeton (b.1985) is a London based photographer and visual artist whose work investigates connection, the environment and our place within it. His documentary style is considered, soft and often sombre. Using muted blacks and rich colours, Will creates images pared down to their raw fundamentals, that carry a positive message.
The environment is a recurrent theme in Templeton’s personal work, as he seeks to use his visual arts practice as a force for Good: "My mission is to undo the negative human impact on the environment by sharing positive stories that help us realise that we are all a part of this beautiful ecosystem and not divorced from it.”
Templeton supports the International Rescue Committee, the Rivers Trust and donates 1% of annual sales to environmental organisations via the 1% for the Planet initiative.
Previous work include Ways and Means: River Pollution in England, a project released as a book by La Mentale publishing in Jan 2024, and Environmentalism in Embakasi, a film shot for Culture COP, which brings the voice of culture to the annual COP conferences. The project documented the work of a young environmental activist in a southern Nairobi urban informal settlement.
@williamtempleton // https://williamjoshuatempleton.com/
#BiodiversityFingerprint