Socially Engaged ART As a Methodological Strategy in Social Science

 This study is based on relational discussions on Socially Engaged Art (SEA), cultural activism, and sociology. SEA (or social art) can be defined as the artistic practices of an interventional nature that are participatory and procedural and that can occur in public or private, formal or informal spaces, transforming art into a specific form of sociability. This article aims to problematize those practices and to promote a dialogue with sociology. To fulfil this objective, the text draws on authors involved in the discussion about SEA, cultural activism, and relational art, along with contemporary artists’ projects that mobilise social and environmental issues in their poetics. The idea is to explore and discuss more fluid and creative forms and methods of addressing socio-environmental problems in social science  through an interactive method that can help complexify the visual element.