The University of Lincoln, UK, is running a Climate Week art exhibition from the 1st November. The exhibition will take place over 12 days on the University’s Brayford Campus.
A curated exhibition of local established environmental artists will be displayed in Project Space+, a dedicated art gallery in the Peter de Wint Building. As well as this, local artists have been invited to submit work relating to the environment. Artists include; Madeline Adams, Henry Dow, Georgia Preece, Nick Simpson, Alexa Mottram and more.
Professor Libby John, Head of the College of Science and Chair of the Environment and Sustainability Committee at the University of Lincoln, said: "We want to invite artists to help to communicate the importance of tacking climate change and sustainability through their work.
“The Climate Week Art Exhibition is a fantastic opportunity for students and the wider community to get involved and spread awareness about this very important message.”
This exhibition is free to enter and open to all.
Artist's panel debate & exhibition opening - 2nd November, 5-7pm
Join us for a private viewing of the One Step Greener Exhibition and panel discussion exploring how a creative practice can be more sustainable and environmentally conscious.
View a digital version of the exhibition below:
FIONA CARRUTHERS
Featuring:
Title: 'Waiting for the King Tide'
Willow Rods, Square Bar, Builders’ Line & Knitting Wire 1 x 2 x 2M. 2021.
Title: Field Studies: The Understory
Digital Prints & Moving Image, 2021.
Can you briefly describe the work in particular how it engages issues of climate change and/or sustainability?
My experience of feeling caught between being in the dark, being culpable and being ambivalent manifests as precarity and a desire for political and social transformation. Lincolnshire’s marshland has a tremendous role to play in sustaining human and non-human environments and ecologies. This includes sequestering and storing carbon dioxide: ‘pound for pound’, these BLUE CARBON ecosystems can store up to 10x more carbon, at a much faster rate, than mature tropical forests.
Can you talk about something you are doing to be more sustainable in your everyday and/or creative life?
Following a vegetarian diet is the most effective sustainable choice I make every day. In my creative practice I like to use found and recycled materials, often reusing these many times. I also choose to use energy efficient processes such as assemblage and digital technologies as much as possible.
GEORGIA PREECE
Title: '2366'
Aluminium, 2018.
Can you briefly describe the work in particular how it engages issues of climate change and/or sustainability?
2366 holes drilled into an aluminium sheet, mapping out oil drilling sites, platforms and rigs across the gulf of Mexico. Each puncture in the sheet of aluminium individually represents a significant marker of the anthropocene. With Aluminium also being a key marker of the transition from the Holocene to Anthropocene.
Can you talk about something you are doing to be more sustainable in your everyday and/or creative life?
As Environment Editor of the Radical Art Review, I aim to promote intersectional environmentalism, engaging with sustainability beyond western ideals. I am on a continuous journey to educate myself and improve my own environmental journey by understanding my own ethical standpoint and which environmental campaigns that I might align myself with. My practice in its nature treads gently due to my small physical output.
TOM MARTIN
Title: 'Hezoudé Beekeepers Cooperative'
Photography. 2020.
Can you briefly describe the work in particular how it engages issues of climate change and/or sustainability?
In the Abdulaye Forest, Togo, the Hezoudé Beekeepers Cooperative are developing ways of earning a living form their environment in a sustainable way. Instead of cutting back the forest to grow crops, they are making use of the diverse range of flora by setting up apiaries, producing some of the best honey I have ever tasted! This approach means they are living sustainably and in harmony with nature, this has been shown to slow down and even reverse the effects of deforestation.
Can you talk about something you are doing to be more sustainable in your everyday and/or creative life?
As a humanitarian photographer I travel a lot for my work, this has always been an issue that plays on my mind in terms of the environmental impact. To address this I ensure that the carbon footprint of this travel is offset. I also try to bring environmental issues into the stories that I tell, it is becoming increasingly apparent that the environment and our impact upon it is causing serious challenges for those most at risk in our world.
Wider context:
In 2020 I visited the Abdulaye Forest in Togo. A story that really stands out for me is the Hezoudé Beekeepers Cooperative, this community of beekeepers in the Abdulaye forest are developing ways of earning a living form their environment in a sustainable way. Instead of cutting back the forest to grow crops, they are making use of the diverse range of flora by setting up apiaries, producing some of the best honey I have ever tasted! This approach means they are living sustainably and in harmony with nature, and has been shown to slow down and even reverse the effects of deforestation. The bees also love shea nut trees, another local group, ‘Essodounissi Womens Shea Nut Butter Cooperative’ make sustainable shea nut butter from local resources, working together to support one another. Shea nut trees are an important species of flora in the forest, and have previously been chopped down to make way for farmland. By collecting the nuts and using them to make she nut butter the trees stay, and the community benefit from a higher value cash crop.
Find out more about the work of VSF Suisse here: https://www.vsf-suisse.org/
MADELINE ADAMS
Featuring:
Title: 1st."To Think"
Sustainably & ethically sourced British beech, with dried local pine needles. Collection of 6 pine needle brushes, 270x 40mm, 2021.
Title: 2nd. "To Sit"
Sustainably & ethically sourced British Beech. A stool, 600x470mm. 2021.
Can you briefly describe the work in particular how it engages issues of climate change and/or sustainability?
These objects address the need for experimental thinking when it comes to material and tools; while discussing and reconnecting to where our materials are sourced. Asking who has touched them at each stage, and not to look at an object with only 2 dimensional thought.
Can you talk about something you are doing to be more sustainable in your every day and/or creative life?
I have a design business built on the fundamentals of putting environmental, animal and human rights first. All materials are locally sourced by sustainable means or through salvaging projects that would otherwise be waste.
ALEXA MOTTRAM
Featuring:
Leather Slippers made from pre - and post-consumer waste
Carpet, leather, wool, upholstery fabrics, 2021.
Reclaimed: A Film about Materials and People
Digital media.
Can you briefly describe the work in particular how it engages issues of climate change and/or sustainability?
I make footwear from reclaimed materials (offcuts from the upholstery industry among others). It's designed for repair and I offer those services as part of the business model. I feel passionate about respecting the materials and energy/carbon cost that has been paid in producing them.
Can you talk about something you are doing to be more sustainable in your every day and/or creative life?
I'm eating less meat and diary.
HENRY DOW // FROCKTOPUS
Title: 'Plastic Strawbans are Eco-ablelism, not Eco-activism'
Yarn, labelmaker, crochet. A3. 2021.
Can you briefly describe the work in particular how it engages issues of climate change and/or sustainability?
This piece is about how ecological issues are often co-opted into eugenics, especially around disability, and highlights the hypocrisy of people calling to ban things we need to survive, purely because our lives (and the things that sustain them) are seen as less valuable.
Can you talk about something you are doing to be more sustainable in your every day and/or creative life?
I personally don't have much choice around my consumption, it's controlled by what is available to housebound people, accessible for my disability, and how little carers are funded to do. I campaign for higher care funding for disabled people, to have more control over our consumption, and lives in general.
ANNIE MORRAD
Title: ‘Connections’
2021, Silent Video 12 min looped.
Can you briefly describe the work in particular how it engages issues of climate change and/or sustainability?
The video asks that observers reassess their relationship with non-human animal species. The videos produce an encounter asking the observer/viewer to find commonality between themselves and a wild Canada goose. The Goose brings knowledge of another life. We both need to breathe. The Goose and us breathe the same air.
Can you talk about something you are doing to be more sustainable in your every day and/or creative life?
I am a plant-based eater. I do not use products with palm oil, only soya from producers sourced in Europe. For European travel, including the UK, I use the train. I do not drive a car. I use public transport. I make objects from sustainable products.
JOANA CIFRE CERDÀ
Title: 'Where do we draw the line?'
Collaged Newspaper, 2021.
Can you briefly describe the work in particular how it engages issues of climate change and/or sustainability?
The first part of the piece is a collage with a set of instructions. The second part is in the viewer’s imagination. I wanted to make a piece that as well as being sustainable instigated reflection on limits. where are we prepared to draw the line?
Can you talk about something you are doing to be more sustainable in your everyday and/or creative life?
As a visual artist I find that it is difficult to be totally sustainable. Even just using our brain to come up with ideas is only as sustainable as the food that we use to fuel it. I have cut down on meat consumption, reduced use of plastic and I make my own inks.
NICK SIMPSON
Title: Observational Endeavour
Polaroid, 2019-2021.
Can you briefly describe the work in particular how it engages issues of climate change and/or sustainability?
To understand the importance of your environment you first must observe and care about the environment you find yourself in, with only 8 shots at a time to play with and the high cost, careful consideration was given to each one. It was this process that gave me the lesson in making time to stop and look, and which nurtured my relationship with my surroundings. An observational endeavour.
Can you talk about something you are doing to be more sustainable in your everyday and/or creative life?
As a practicing artist I have always been interested in re-using what already exists both in the use of materials and techniques. I'm interested in merging the old and the new to create something new. Change in the everyday is vital for me, swapping to more sustainable household products, cleaning and sanctuary, eating less meat, recycling and growing our own food. I think a lot of people are doing these things now but it's down to the individual to make these changes. I also believe in understand and the importance of understanding/kindness and opening the dialogue to help encourage change.
CONOHAR SCOTT // ENVIRONMENTAL RESISTANCE
Title: Micorosa: residual landscape of fly-ash
From the series No Al Carbone, colour photograph, 2015.
Can you briefly describe the work in particular how it engages issues of climate change and/or sustainability?
In collaboration with the activists No Al Carbone, this body of work profiles the dangers associated with fossil fuel energy production in Brindisi, South Italy. A residual landscape of fly-ash, resulting from the burning of coal at Cerrano coal-fired power station, leaches heavy metals into sub-aquifers, polluting the ecosystem.
Can you talk about something you are doing to be more sustainable in your everyday and/or creative life?
As a member of the Lincoln Centre for Ecological Justice (LinCEJ), I use my practice to campaign for ecological justice, and to further the interests of those ecosystems and communities who have been disenfranchised by the hubris of industrial polluters.
Open Call Submissions
For our open call, we invited local artists to submit pieces of environmentally related art to our One Step Greener exhibition at the University of Lincoln. Seven artists were chosen to be exhibited alongside our curated exhibition during 1st - 12th November 2021.
LISA MITCHELL
Title: 'Fog at Stapleford'
Photograph.
Can you briefly describe the work in particular how it engages issues of climate change and/or sustainability? The image was taken one early foggy morning in Stapleford Woods, the beauty of the trees magnified by the atmospheric weather. The transient moment which had changed within minutes. Trees are our life blood and more and more are disappearing and being torn down by the year, replaced by more housing and business premises. Their removal means that our lessened green spaces are only helping to fast track us all into further ozone erosion and the climate change crisis we now find ourselves in. We must act, and now!
Can you talk about something you are doing to be more sustainable in your everyday and/or creative life? I have been trying to use more sustainable and recycled products to print my images onto including reconstituted papers for my business cards and reclaimed wood for my frames.
LIME GREEN WELLY
Title: 'Spiral Bale'
Raw Wool.
Can you briefly describe the work in particular how it engages issues of climate change and/or sustainability? A roll of hand felted locally sourced wool from my family farm, a constructed spiral sitting at 3 foot in diameter and 1 foot high. The work uses sustainability materials questioning the value and its impact on the environment. It was made in response to a decommissioned wool mill in the midlands, this comparison of modern day factory’s and the materials used creates a conversation around the materials we use in the everyday as well as in the creation of our work.
Can you talk about something you are doing to be more sustainable in your everyday and/or creative life? As an artist I strive to use recycled or eco friendly materials as much as possible within my work responding to the land and city that surround me. I am also a trained forager and attempt to forage as much as possible in my day to day life.
JESSIE DAVIES
Title: Climate Change: Construction - Destruction
Acrylic and mixed media on board.
Can you briefly describe the work in particular how it engages issues of climate change and/or sustainability? The painting focuses on threatened fresh water wetland habitats on the Humber estuary, raising awareness of these unique habitats.
Can you talk about something you are doing to be more sustainable in your everyday and/or creative life? The artwork itself incorporates littered and discarded objects found around the wetlands. These items are then collaged and used as materials for the paintings.
ROSIE ABLEWHITE
Title: Mycorrhizal
Spore prints using locally sourced fungi & photographs
Can you briefly describe the work in particular how it engages issues of climate change and/or sustainability? My digital piece 'Mycorrhizal' is made using spore prints of locally-sourced fungi, along with images from their environment. Without the mycelial networks of fungi, the forest would not be able to survive. Fungi are vital, not only for recycling nutrients (in breaking down organic matter), but are essential for the growth of most plants. In this digital collage, I wanted to highlight just some of the diversity that I encountered whilst foraging for these mushrooms. Encounters which I had in an ecosystem that exists entirely because of the presence of fungi, spreading their spores.
Can you talk about something you are doing to be more sustainable in your everyday and/or creative life? I've signed up to monthly walking and cycling challenges and litter-picks, encouraging others to do so, and taking more sustainable transport whenever possible.
FIONNA BUCK
Title: 'Wild Daffodils'
Watercolour on paper.
Can you briefly describe the work in particular how it engages issues of climate change and/or sustainability? Wild Daffodils were once abundant in the UK but are now very rare due to loss of habitat.
Can you talk about something you are doing to be more sustainable in your everyday and/or creative life? Trying to mainly eat a plant based diet.
SUE HART
Title: 'The song of the Otter'
Acrylic on watercolour paper.
Can you briefly describe the work in particular how it engages issues of climate change and/or sustainability? My artwork is of an Otter within its body is a fresh water habitat showing the biodiversity of plant and animal life to be found in clean unpolluted water. The growing pressure from human activity and the hotter drier Summers is a threat to these vulnerable areas
Can you talk about something you are doing to be more sustainable in your everyday and/or creative life? In my everyday life I grow some of my own vegetables and eat more plant based food. Use public transport or walk. Recently I started my some of my own clothes using my grandmother's old hand cranked sewing machine.
VICTORIA SAYER
Untitled
Digital.
Victoria is our youngest artist at age 12.
The image depicts the slums of Dharvavi. We see the train track and the strong inference of sun. A highly populated poor area where much work goes on and they are provided with clean water for two hours in the morning by government. She feels that it is places like this that will mostly feel the effect of climate change. You can also see the train track, installed by the Brits but entirely inaccessible to the residents of Dharvavi. Which is a shame as it is perhaps their only way out.
Did you enjoy this exhibition? Please drop us a like below if so!
Credits:
All artwork presented on this webpage is credited to each respective artist.