Picture shows 'Disobedience Makes History' workshop participants using the windows of Tate Modern to make their feelings known, 30.1.10
Pressure is growing on the Tate to ditch BP as sponsor, preferably in time for the opening of its new
extension in 2012.
This is from Art Monthly's March editorial, reporting on a recent workshop titled 'Disobedience Makes History', held there by artist/activist John Jordan with 30 participants, many of whom are now committed to seeing Tate live up to its sustainability rhetoric and go BP-free:
IN ADVANCE OF A BROKEN ARM
The insistence that public art institutions bring in funding from the private sector is looking less clever now.
Post crash, sponsorship has evaporated, threatening the survival of those, like the Institute of Contemporary
Arts, that came to rely on it. Even the most powerful institutions, such as Tate Modern,
are now so timid when it comes to their sponsors that it affects their programming.
What, then, might another model of funding look like?
The pity of it is that the UK's flagship museum of modern and contemporary art should feel so exposed and vulnerable to the vagaries of sponsors that it engages in this form of self-censorship - in advance of a broken arm, so to speak.'
Here's a snippet from his piece in the magazine:
ON REFUSING TO PRETEND TO DO POLITICS IN A MUSEUM
John Jordan on what happened when Tate programmed a workshop on disobedience 'What is it about the word "disobedience" that the institutional art world doesn't understand? Last autumn the Nikolaj Contemporary Art Centre in Copenhagen dropped the Laboratory of Insurrectionary Imagination's Bike Bloc project when it realised that the "tools of civil disobedience" that we were going to build were not gestures but actual tools and tactics for the protest actions around the UN's COP15 Climate Change Conference. The curator told us that she feared that the museum's funders, the City of Copenhagen, would not support any "illegal" activity. It seemed that she had assumed we would pretend to do politics.'
This letter was sent by a participant in the 'Disobedience' workshop concerning Tate's March 19th symposium
'Rising to the climate challenge: artists and scientists imagine tomorrow's world'.
Subject: Tate Modern Symposium on 20 March: Oil-free Tate by 2012? Date: Fri, 05 Mar 2010 09:53:33 +0000
From: Barry Mason <
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>
To:
Robert Bloomfield
Agnes Denes
Professor Brian Hoskins
Luca Orta
Professor Corinne le Quere
Professor Steve Rayner
Tomas Saraceno
Rising to the Climate Challenge: Oil free Tate by 2012?
I'm so looking forward to this. Thank you.
The symposium includes the chance to formulate propositions for change,
whilst imagining the social and psychological impacts of climate change.
I've been a huge admirer of Tate even since I settled in London as a
very young 18 year-old. I've grown up with the Tate as it's changed into
a world leader, taste-changer and opinion former.
The symposium on 20 March gives us all a unique and unmissable
opportunity to do something very positive and very visible about climate
change. It's time for positive action.
Since...
*Tate's new Taking Tate Forward policy document says "our priorities to
2012 include wanting to be a leader in sustainability and setting a
great example..."
*Tate has now appointed internal Green Champions to ensure recycling etc.
in their offices etc
*progressive opinion-forming UK institutions need to start doing much
more about climate change and energy use very soon
*increasing numbers of Tate Members, Tate staff and local Southwark
people feel strongly about the point...
...it would seem essential and world-exemplary for us to help Tate wean
itself off oil company sponsorship in time for the opening of the Tate
Modern 2 in 2012 - and the hugely symbolic conversion of the three
massive clover-leaf underground oil tanks into public art space. Art not
oil.
So, a great, doable, effective, leadership action from this symposium
would be to get all present to very publically agree to help Tate make
that move to new areas of funding and away from fossil fuel money, in
just the same way that museums and galleries dropped tobacco sponsorship
10 years ago. A big pointer to a better world.
And I'll be saying all this at the symposium and asking the room to vote
on that proposition.
It would be wonderful if you, as a Panel member, could back this timely
move too.
Very best wishes.
Barry Mason
Tate Member 56256
Rotherhithe
London
SE16 7FJ
07905 889 005
And this letter was sent to many Tate employees in early March:
Dear Penelope Curtis,
It looks as if BP's involvement in oil tar sands is triggering a strong wave of civil society unrest. It seems positive change is afoot, and if the Tate was to jump in ahead of the game and refuse to take any more sponsorship from such sources, it would receive widespread acclaim. How about it?
I would be very grateful if this issue could be discussed at the next meeting of Tate Trustees.
Please let me know if and when this takes place.
Yours in hope,
Mark Brown from Art Not Oil
1.) Urgent action request: is your pension fuelling climate change?
Dear Supporter,
This spring, your pension provider will use shareholdings in BP and Shell held on your behalf to vote for – or against – a resolution on one of the biggest single factors driving climate change. You have the opportunity to influence their vote.
Tar sands are among the world’s dirtiest fuels: their extraction produces on average three times the greenhouse gases of conventional oil. The pollution, deforestation and wildlife disturbance associated with tar sands developments also threaten the traditional livelihoods and wellbeing of indigenous communities.
Tar sands developments could also put pension savings at risk: industry analysts increasingly warn that tar sands could be long-term loss-makers.
The resolutions are already supported by some major investors, but we need you to use the power of your pension or savings to force a review of this damaging and risky activity. You can express your concerns directly to your pension provider or (if you don't have one) by emailing one of BP and Shell's largest shareholders.
* End of Fair Pensions text *
This Greenpeace tar sands video on Tar Sands is quite a punchy (and polemical) intro:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KokiUgvlwc4
2.) I'd also really recommend Rena Effendi's photography from BP's Baku-Ceyhan pipeline: www.refendi.com
This short film of her work with her commentary is terrific:
ART NOT OIL 2010 DIARY: now down to a rock-bottom £5!
Written by Administrator
Monday, 01 June 2009
They charge us 3.4%, so if you want to send us
a cheque for £6.05 (being £5 plus £1.05 for postage), made payable to London Rising Tide, and even better with an addressed
A4 envelope, that would be top. The address is:
Art Not Oil, c/o LARC, 62 Fieldgate Street, London E1 1ES.
Or make a transfer to:
London Rising Tide
Co-Op account
Sort code: 089299
AC: 65117103
(Let us know if that's what you do.)
Send us an email if you're outside the UK, and we'll sort postage etc. that way.
If you're a bookshop, our distributor is Central:
Central Books Ltd, 99 Wallis Road, London , E9 5LN
Tel 44 (0)845 458 9911 Fax 44(0)845 458 9912
email contactus @ centralbooks.com
www.centralbooks.com
THE ART NOT OIL DIARY 2010;
(abandon despair all ye who enter here...
The Art Not Oil Diary 2010 is a beautiful, stirring 365 day reminder of
the extraordinary art that is being made in the struggle for a safer, more
just future, and the crucial role that our creativity will need to play if
we’re to have a chance of
reaching that place.
Rarely sighted in the airbrushed outlets of the mainstream media, a
time-honoured tradition of spirited, radical art is finding more than
enough inspiration in a new century not only blighted by oil wars and
climate chaos, but also blessed with reinvigorated movements for social
and ecological justice.
A fair amount of that art has made its way over the last six years into
the many galleries of Art Not Oil (ANO), a project set up in 2004 by
Rising Tide in part to see in the last days of fossil fuel industry
sponsorship of the
arts. (Grassroots exhibitions and creative direct actions make up ANO’s
versatile toolbox.)
2010 sees it reach its 7th birthday, and to celebrate, it has produced a
desk diary jammed with resistance-fuelled artwork drawn from its nine
galleries, with flashes of humour, glimpses of darkness and even one or
two upbeat visions of the future. 52 of the strongest pieces submitted so
far have been gathered together in a compellingly-designed spiral-bound
diary that will appeal to artists, would-be artists, activists,
would-be-activists, and anyone who wants a diary that is possessed of
beauty as well as bite.
It also contains a future ‘fantasy timeline’ of some of the necessary
inspirations that might get us to a moment in 2020 when we can celebrate
the end of fossil fuelled arts sponsorship.
The diary was launched on October 3rd at the Arnolfini Gallery in
Bristol as part of PLATFORM's 'C Words' (Carbon, Climate, Capital,
Culture) series of events: http://www.platformlondon.org;
www.100days.org.uk
A diary flyer is available as a small .pdf, as is a 2 pager featuring some
of the work we've chosen. Let us know if you'd like a copy of either or
both.
Oh, and it can be bought in various bookshops throughout the UK, or online
via www.artnotoil.org.uk
--------------------------------------
Art Not Oil:
c/o 62 Fieldgate Street, London E1 1ES; Tel: 07709 545116
www.artnotoil.org.uk - (keep sending us your art!)
Older press release:
ART NOT OIL: CELEBRATING 7th BIRTHDAY BY LAUNCHING 2010 DIARY
Art Not Oil, set up by London Rising Tide in 2004 to combat oil
company sponsorship and greenwash in UK cultural institutions,
is to celebrate its seventh year with a 2010 desk diary.
As well as continuing with its grassroots combination of exhibitions and
direct action, Art Not Oil (ANO) is going to take its message into the
bookshops with a diary that will feature some of the best work from its
galleries of over 400 artworks. ANO is asking artists to put forward work
that addresses or echoes these themes in whatever way they choose, and it
is also on the lookout for designers to contribute to the project.
The diary will contain a past timeline of the story so far in the journey
to see the back of oil industry arts sponsorship, not to mention a future
fantasy timeline of some of the necessary inspirations that might get us
to a moment in 2015 when we can celebrate the end of such sponsorship, and
perhaps also the prospect of fossil fuel companies becoming persona non
grata in society, with their 'licence to operate' revoked.
One example of the fantasy timeline might be: 'November 17th 2011:
Tracy Emin publicly and powerfully removes all her
work from BP-sponsored Tate Britain'
Sam Chase from Art Not Oil said:
'In a world where campaigns come and go, Art Not Oil has stood its ground,
built a strong foundation of support amongst politicised artists
worldwide, helped to spread their work and inspired new artists to use
their talents to make the world a fairer, greener place. It has also shown
the UK's cultural institutions and the climate-destabilising oil companies
that they have come to rely on for support, (since governments diverted
funding towards other foolhardy and sometimes murderous endeavours), that
there is a growing groundswell of discontent about this situation, a
situation that we are proud to be playing a part in ending.'
Jo Traynor added: 'The 2010 diary will be a beautiful, stirring 365 day
reminder of the extraordinary art that is being made in the struggle for a
safer, more just future, and the crucial role that our creativity will
need to play if we are to have a chance of reaching that place.'
It will be launched in October at the Arnolfini Gallery in Bristol.
All profits will go towards the next seven years - or however long it takes
- of the Art Not Oil campaign, as well as communities resisting oil and gas extraction
in the global south.
Art Not Oil
c/o 62 Fieldgate Street, London E1 1ES; Tel: 07709 545116
www.artnotoil.org.uk - (send us your art!)
Background
Art Not Oil stands for 'creativity, climate justice and an end to oil
industry sponsorship of the arts', and works using a combination of
alternative grassroots exhibitions (both online and 'actual'), creative
direct actions and communications.
It has focused on the BP Portrait Award, the (no-longer, thanks in part to
us) Shell-sponsored Wildlife Photographer of the Year Award , as well as
making several 'interventions' at Tate Britain, National Gallery, National
Theatre, Royal Opera and British Museum.
Last Updated ( Wednesday, 10 February 2010 )
Art Not Oil invites you to 'A Wake for BP', (British Museum 6.5.09)
Written by Administrator
Tuesday, 24 February 2009
And this is how it turned out...(photos courtesy of Amelia Gregory; www.ameliagregory.com)
