* Come early (6.30pm) to see some early footage of the new Carbon Trade Watch film of video letters sent between the BP Grangemouth refinery in Scotland and the people suffering in the monoculture eucalyptus plantation in Brazil where BP are buying carbon credits to 'offset' their Grangemouth emissions, (it's sure to be clearer than that explanation!)

* Loads of other oily/climatic films and images will be playing all night

* Food's up 7ish (free or donation)

* There'll be a set by the Society of Imaginary Friends at 8pm

* At about 9 there'll be a collision between a 2012 Show political-poetical-musical sound set and various artists painting the Four Walls of the Apocalypse or thereabouts

* Bring a T-shirt for an Art Not Oil super-limited DIY edition

Here's the whole blurb:

ART NOT OIL 2005: A TRUER PORTRAIT OF AN OIL COMPANY?

* online at www.artnotoil.org.uk
* Institute for Autonomy, 76-78 Gower Street, London WC1 (Goodge St. tube), 12-6pm, June 10-18th.
* June 9th launch night (6-10pm) includes exhibition, films, food, live music, talks & DIY anti-oil art.
* Monday 13th June, 6-8pm: mobile gallery outside the National Petroleum Gallery on the evening of the BP Portrait Award presentation ceremony.
* Edinburgh, 1st week of July; Oxford House, London, during August.

- For postcards with this info (& a portrait of a BP-branded Saddam Hussein), email  info@artnotoil.org.uk
...and send us your art!

*****

Art Not Oil is an annual event aimed at encouraging artists to create work that explores the damage that companies like BP are doing to the planet, and the role art can play in counteracting that damage.

It is designed in part to paint a truer portrait of an oil company than the caring image manufactured by the BP Portrait Award, run by the National Portrait Gallery (NPG), a search for the year's 'best' portrait which also helps to divert public attention and indignation from BP's core activities.

Climate chaos is set to have a catastrophic effect on all of us, while hitting the poorest hardest. Oil is a curse that also fuels war, poverty and environmental destruction. Yet the companies most responsible are profiting handsomely, and they are still welcome it seems in many of our most prestigious public galleries and museums. Why?

Art Not Oil 2005 will include paintings, photos, sculpture and other work that addresses issues like climate chaos, shiny corporate public relations (also known as 'greenwash') and the suicidal madness that proclaims 'profit is king'. We also welcome work dealing with the cancerous impact of the oil industry on the planet, and work that dares to imagine what solutions to these serious but not insoluble problems might look like.

We have a very fetching postcard of BP boss Lord Browne, which was the People's Choice from Art Not Oil 2004. If you're able to help spread the word using these or are just interested for yourself, send us an address and the amount you'd like.

The exhibition is online at www.artnotoil.org.uk, and will open at the Institute for Autonomy, 76-78 Gower Street, WC1, from June 9-18th. The Thursday June 9th launch night will run from 6-10pm and will also include films, food, talks and DIY anti-oil art.

From 6-8pm on Monday June 13th, we'll be bringing Art Not Oil to the National Petroleum Gallery, rubbing shoulders with art glitterati, Cabinet Ministers et al as they arrive for the BP Portrait Award presentation ceremony. (Come as or bring a portrait of an oil company!)

Then Art Not Oil 2005 will move to Edinburgh, since the G8 will be there in July, as will many thousands of protesters calling for justice, freedom and a fossil fuel-free future.

As well as returning to London to spend August at Oxford House in Bethnal Green, we also plan for the exhibition to be present in Sunderland and Edinburgh in autumn/winter 2005/6, since the BP Portrait Award exhibition will tour to these cities.

Do you know a great place for an exhibition like this, either this year or in years to come? Could you put any time into helping make it happen? Or do you have something you'd like to exhibit? If so, it would be great to hear from you.

Contact us on: 07708 794665
 info@artnotoil.org.uk
c/o 62 Fieldgate Street, London E1 1ES.
www.artnotoil.org.uk
www.nationalpetroleumgallery.org.uk
www.londonrisingtide.org.uk