ART NOT OIL 2006: CALL FOR ENTRIES
Des Violaris | 16.02.2006 15:34 | Globalisation
2006 looks like being another year when the gulf between what oil companies do and what they say grows even wider. Iraq is still in flames, with hungry oil executives eager for the insurgency to be locked down enough to give themselves easy access to the privatised prize of its oil. Hurricanes, droughts and freak heatwaves are all gathering speed. And more and more people are noticing the seasons turned on their heads or nursing quiet terrors about what sort of destabilised world we’re hurtling towards.
So what do BP, Shell, Exxon and the rest of them dream up to keep us consuming instead of questioning and resisting? They pump their windfall profits into turning up the volume of the propaganda machine. Which means more and louder lying - sorry, “advertising” - about how green they are, and more cultural sponsorship. Why else is it that Shell has just announced that it is the proud new sponsor of the Wildlife Photographer of the Year Award? Could it be that it doesn’t want you to know about the systemic destruction in Russia, Ireland, Nigeria and wherever else it operates?
Making a living out of making art is tough. But in times of crisis, isn’t it an artist’s responsibility to create wake-up calls? To reflect our emotional responses to this scary political, social and ecological landscape? In the recent past artists often relied on government support, whereas now economic policy encourages corporate sponsorship of the arts. Any examination of corporate culture can leave us in no doubt that this will promote corporate values, and stifle any art which is seen as “off-message”. We’re all complicit in a web of ways in this dirty, dangerous system, but it’s too late to be complacent. We have to act. And we think that the greatest contribution an artist can make is to address the issues of the moment with honesty, vision, anger and love.
WHAT LIES BENEATH THE GREENWASH?
* Shell’s vast development on Russia’s Sakhalin Island will decimate local fishing and despoil one of the few remaining feeding grounds of the world’s last 100 Western Pacific Gray whales. www.pacificenvironment.org
* ExxonMobil still pays climate sceptics to challenge the consensus that climate change is man-made and here now. www.exxonsecrets.org
* ‘Court Declares Gas Flaring Illegal In Nigeria’ (Nov ’05) But flaring still continues and Shell is set to appeal.
www.eraction.org
* Shell (and Statoil)’s plans to build a gas refinery and pipeline in County Mayo, Ireland, resulted in the 94 day imprisonment of 5 farmers, and triggered an ongoing countrywide (and UK) campaign.
www.corribsos.com
* ‘Exposed: BP, its pipeline, and an environmental time-bomb’ Independent (26.6.04) on BP’s US-inspired and protected Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil & gas pipelines, which will be a human rights disaster & produce over 150m tonnes of CO2 each year for 40 years, causing untold damage to the world’s climate.
www.baku.org.uk
* BP, Shell & Exxon have commitments to expand fossil fuel production by at least 3.5% per year. BP invests less than 3% of its annual budget in solar & other renewable energy sources, much less than it ploughs into advertising and sponsorship.
* 15 workers were killed and over 170 injured in an explosion at BP’s Texas City refinery on March 23rd 2005.
THE EXHIBITION
Art Not Oil is a non-profit project aimed at encouraging artists to create work that explores the damage that oil companies are doing to the planet, and the role art can play in counteracting that damage. Now in its third year, it's made up of an online gallery as well as a rolling exhibition which partly shadows the BP Portrait Award, so we invite you to send us your art. In 2006, as well as work that looks at the negative impacts of fossil fuels, we'd like to feature work that looks at positive visions and solutions, even though we know that's more of a creative challenge!
The exhibition will open in London on June 10th 2006, partly to coincide with the opening of the BP Portrait Award at the National Portrait Gallery (NPG). It will end the year in Aberdeen, where the BP Portrait Award exhibition opens in November.
Things you can do:
1. Send us your art!
2. Cut your CO2 emissions: boycott all petrol stations, stay away from airplanes, bath with a friend, get green leccy...
3. Take action on the root causes of climate chaos wherever and however you can, though especially at the Camp for Climate Action, August 26 - Sept 4 2006 www.climatecamp.org.uk
4. Boycott the BP Portrait Award and other similarly sullied prizes.
5. Would you like us to run a workshop on these issues at your college, workplace etc.? If so, it would be great to hear from you.
MORE INFO
This leaflet focuses on the activities of BP, Shell and Exxon, but other oil companies are no better. For more information on the impact of the oil and energy industries see:
www.risingtide.org.uk
www.carbonweb.org
www.oilwatch.org.ec
www.shellfacts.com
www.colombiasolidarity.org.uk
www.amazonwatch.org
Also, you could tell these cultural institutions how you feel about their acceptance of oil money:
snairne@npg.org.uk [Sandy Nairne, NPG, re. BP]
nicholas.serota@tate.org.uk [Tate Britain, re. BP]
jon.tucker@nmsi.ac.uk [Science Museum, re. BP]
info@barbican.org.uk [John Tusa, Barbican, re. BP]
m.dixon@nhm.ac.uk [Michael Dixon, Natural History Museum, re. BP]
tony.hall@roh.org.uk [Royal Opera House, re. BP]
directorate@thebritishmuseum.ac.uk [Neil MacGregor, British Museum, re. BP]
information@ng-london.org.uk [Charles Saumarez Smith, National Gallery, re. Shell, BP & Exxon]
info@nationaltheatre.org.uk [Nicholas Hytner, National Theatre, re. Shell]
HOW TO ENTER
Send us a photo of your piece, or a description, and we’ll take it from there.
T 07708 794665
info@artnotoil.org.uk
Art Not Oil
c/o 62 Fieldgate Street, London, E1 1ES
www.artnotoil.org.uk
www.nationalpetroleumgallery.org.uk
Leaflets, postcards, images & info available on request
Art Not Oil is a project of London Rising Tide: www.londonrisingtide.org.uk
Closing date for entries: May 30th 2006 (give or take a month or two)
Look out also in early 2006 for 'Art Not Oil - the [short] Film'!
“You cannot have ‘art for art’s sake’…art must do something...What is of interest to me is that my art should be able to alter the lives of a large number of people, a whole community, of the entire country...So the stories that I tell must have a different sort of purpose from the artist in the western world…It's not an ego trip, it's serious - it's politics, it's economics, it's everything. And art in that instance becomes so meaningful both to the artist and to the consumers of that art.”
Ken Saro-Wiwa, 1994
More info: www.remembersarowiwa.com
So what do BP, Shell, Exxon and the rest of them dream up to keep us consuming instead of questioning and resisting? They pump their windfall profits into turning up the volume of the propaganda machine. Which means more and louder lying - sorry, “advertising” - about how green they are, and more cultural sponsorship. Why else is it that Shell has just announced that it is the proud new sponsor of the Wildlife Photographer of the Year Award? Could it be that it doesn’t want you to know about the systemic destruction in Russia, Ireland, Nigeria and wherever else it operates?
Making a living out of making art is tough. But in times of crisis, isn’t it an artist’s responsibility to create wake-up calls? To reflect our emotional responses to this scary political, social and ecological landscape? In the recent past artists often relied on government support, whereas now economic policy encourages corporate sponsorship of the arts. Any examination of corporate culture can leave us in no doubt that this will promote corporate values, and stifle any art which is seen as “off-message”. We’re all complicit in a web of ways in this dirty, dangerous system, but it’s too late to be complacent. We have to act. And we think that the greatest contribution an artist can make is to address the issues of the moment with honesty, vision, anger and love.
WHAT LIES BENEATH THE GREENWASH?
* Shell’s vast development on Russia’s Sakhalin Island will decimate local fishing and despoil one of the few remaining feeding grounds of the world’s last 100 Western Pacific Gray whales. www.pacificenvironment.org
* ExxonMobil still pays climate sceptics to challenge the consensus that climate change is man-made and here now. www.exxonsecrets.org
* ‘Court Declares Gas Flaring Illegal In Nigeria’ (Nov ’05) But flaring still continues and Shell is set to appeal.
www.eraction.org
* Shell (and Statoil)’s plans to build a gas refinery and pipeline in County Mayo, Ireland, resulted in the 94 day imprisonment of 5 farmers, and triggered an ongoing countrywide (and UK) campaign.
www.corribsos.com
* ‘Exposed: BP, its pipeline, and an environmental time-bomb’ Independent (26.6.04) on BP’s US-inspired and protected Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil & gas pipelines, which will be a human rights disaster & produce over 150m tonnes of CO2 each year for 40 years, causing untold damage to the world’s climate.
www.baku.org.uk
* BP, Shell & Exxon have commitments to expand fossil fuel production by at least 3.5% per year. BP invests less than 3% of its annual budget in solar & other renewable energy sources, much less than it ploughs into advertising and sponsorship.
* 15 workers were killed and over 170 injured in an explosion at BP’s Texas City refinery on March 23rd 2005.
THE EXHIBITION
Art Not Oil is a non-profit project aimed at encouraging artists to create work that explores the damage that oil companies are doing to the planet, and the role art can play in counteracting that damage. Now in its third year, it's made up of an online gallery as well as a rolling exhibition which partly shadows the BP Portrait Award, so we invite you to send us your art. In 2006, as well as work that looks at the negative impacts of fossil fuels, we'd like to feature work that looks at positive visions and solutions, even though we know that's more of a creative challenge!
The exhibition will open in London on June 10th 2006, partly to coincide with the opening of the BP Portrait Award at the National Portrait Gallery (NPG). It will end the year in Aberdeen, where the BP Portrait Award exhibition opens in November.
Things you can do:
1. Send us your art!
2. Cut your CO2 emissions: boycott all petrol stations, stay away from airplanes, bath with a friend, get green leccy...
3. Take action on the root causes of climate chaos wherever and however you can, though especially at the Camp for Climate Action, August 26 - Sept 4 2006 www.climatecamp.org.uk
4. Boycott the BP Portrait Award and other similarly sullied prizes.
5. Would you like us to run a workshop on these issues at your college, workplace etc.? If so, it would be great to hear from you.
MORE INFO
This leaflet focuses on the activities of BP, Shell and Exxon, but other oil companies are no better. For more information on the impact of the oil and energy industries see:
www.risingtide.org.uk
www.carbonweb.org
www.oilwatch.org.ec
www.shellfacts.com
www.colombiasolidarity.org.uk
www.amazonwatch.org
Also, you could tell these cultural institutions how you feel about their acceptance of oil money:
snairne@npg.org.uk [Sandy Nairne, NPG, re. BP] nicholas.serota@tate.org.uk [Tate Britain, re. BP] jon.tucker@nmsi.ac.uk [Science Museum, re. BP] info@barbican.org.uk [John Tusa, Barbican, re. BP] m.dixon@nhm.ac.uk [Michael Dixon, Natural History Museum, re. BP] tony.hall@roh.org.uk [Royal Opera House, re. BP] directorate@thebritishmuseum.ac.uk [Neil MacGregor, British Museum, re. BP] information@ng-london.org.uk [Charles Saumarez Smith, National Gallery, re. Shell, BP & Exxon] info@nationaltheatre.org.uk [Nicholas Hytner, National Theatre, re. Shell] HOW TO ENTER
Send us a photo of your piece, or a description, and we’ll take it from there.
T 07708 794665
info@artnotoil.org.uk Art Not Oil
c/o 62 Fieldgate Street, London, E1 1ES
www.artnotoil.org.uk
www.nationalpetroleumgallery.org.uk
Leaflets, postcards, images & info available on request
Art Not Oil is a project of London Rising Tide: www.londonrisingtide.org.uk
Closing date for entries: May 30th 2006 (give or take a month or two)
Look out also in early 2006 for 'Art Not Oil - the [short] Film'!
“You cannot have ‘art for art’s sake’…art must do something...What is of interest to me is that my art should be able to alter the lives of a large number of people, a whole community, of the entire country...So the stories that I tell must have a different sort of purpose from the artist in the western world…It's not an ego trip, it's serious - it's politics, it's economics, it's everything. And art in that instance becomes so meaningful both to the artist and to the consumers of that art.”
Ken Saro-Wiwa, 1994
More info: www.remembersarowiwa.com
Des Violaris