The untune residency is a non-discipline specific programme for (inter)national artists and creative practitioners to experiment, observe, learn, exchange ideas, and collaborate. We encourage the exploration and research of site-specific histories and ecologies, as well as the socio-cultural transfiguration of collective spaces in Los Angeles and California’s central coast. Selected creatives are offered guidance, space, and time to work on their own projects, collaborate with the surrounding bodies (wildlife, community, and land) and engage in daily regenerative activities (untune’s guiding principles) to learn new skills and strengthen our cohabitation instincts. These activities aim to collectively slow down the energy flow with the intention to inspire a zero-waste practice, food sustainability and accessibility, community growth, and mind/heart nourishment
Residency Details
This will be the first year untune invites creatives to apply for 3 week (two locations) or 1 week (one location) residencies:
Option one (3 weeks): two weeks at canvas 5025 (located in North East Los Angeles) and one week at Rancho Arroyo Grande (RAG, located in California’s central coast). We will be driving together from one location to the other and stopping at sites of interest along the route. The distance between the locations is approximately 300 km. This program is organized in a way to allow for non-local artists to engage with local artists.
Option two (1 week): One week at Rancho Arroyo Grande (located in California’s central coast) near the Los Padres National Forest. We will be accepting more applicants for this one week residency because the site can accommodate a greater number of people. The options are to either meet us in Los Angeles to travel together/caravan to the site OR you’re welcome to meet us at the location if you happen to be in San Luis Obispo county or traveling through the central coast.
Dates: Winter Season – APPLICATION DEADLINE: DECEMBER 22, 2023
Cohort 1: Monday Feb 5 – Monday Feb 26, 2024 (3 weeks, both sites) Monday Feb 12 – Sunday Feb 18, 2024 (1 week, only RAG)
* Spring, Summer, and Fall cohorts will be announced in January 2024.
Please visit our website and FAQ sheet for more details about the artist residency and the two sites (RAG and CANVAS 5025).
“I firmly believe that we will discover ancient wisdom, how to build growth and thrive in harmony with nature. This wisdom will come from every corner of the earth. We have so much to learn from one another and from our ancestors. This challenge is as much about artificial intelligence as it is about ancestral intelligence.”
On Saturday, 9 December at 4:45pm GST, cultural voices pick up this conversation at an official UN COP28 side event “Ancestral Wisdom Driving Low Carbon, Climate Resilient Futures: Asia-Pacific and Global Lessons.” The event will be livestreamed.
In the Global Stocktake framework, this session highlights how greater focus on ancestral wisdom & traditional practices including heritage vernacular architecture that pre-date (or work independently of) the fossil fuel era can accelerate progress towards climate resilient, low-carbon living today.
Photographer and writer Joan Sullivan shares her realisation that, no longer content to simply document climate change, a more fluid, non-linear visual language can evoke the nonhuman voice and reflect our own impermanence in a rapidly warming world.
2,300 words: estimated reading time = 9 minutes
A camera is a tool for learning how to see without a camera. — Dorothea Lange
Earlier this year, I had the great pleasure to collaborate with a sound artist, Robin Servant, to create an interactive climate change art installation in Quebec, Canada. The result of our collaboration was ‘La voix des glaces’ (in English: ‘Ice Voices’), a multi-sensory installation that gives voice to the nonhuman: the disappearing ice on the Saint Lawrence River.
This was the first time that I exhibited my photographs as tactile sculptures. I grouped 24 of my abstract photographs of the rapidly disappearing river ice into eight triangular triptychs suspended from the ceiling in the center of the gallery. Swaying in the natural air currents of the gallery, these ‘ice sculptures’ resembled floating blocks of ice in the Saint Lawrence River.
Each photograph was embossed with braille text from recent IPCC reports. Visitors – both sighted and visually-impaired – were invited to touch the braille relief in a gesture symbolic of our collective blindness to climate change.
By touching my photographs, visitors triggered underwater audio recordings of the ice blocks as they shift and crack from friction, waves and tidal movements. Every time someone touched an image, the gallery filled with haunting, otherworldly ice voices. They destabilize us, pulling us into their evocative vortex, coaxing us to listen more intently. We find ourselves imagining what the ice is trying to tell us.
Giving voice to the nonhuman has, since 2019, transformed my photographic practice from documentary to abstraction. This shift was triggered by two events. The first (which will likely repeat itself in 2023) was Australia’s 2019-2020 Black Summer – the catastrophic, uncontrollable wildfires that killed an estimated three billion nonhuman beings. I was traumatized by the images of blood-red skies, charred kangaroos clinging to fences, and birds falling out of the sky. I suddenly realized that I could no longer participate in documenting climate change. I felt an overpowering sense of urgency to find a more fluid, non-linear, non-narrative language with which to express my ecoanxiety.
The second event that made me question the role of photography in the Anthropocene was a 2019 interview with the author Amitav Ghosh. Responding to a question from Amy Brady, Ghosh explains:
“I think, in literary terms, the most difficult challenge a writer has in an age of climate change is determining how to give a voice to the non-human(emphasis added). And not just in terms of natural disaster – in general. It’s such a challenge. One writer who has done this very well is Richard Powers. I thought his book, The Overstory, was a huge event because it expanded the boundaries of what writers can do. Now I am asking similar questions: How do we restore nonhuman voices? How do we trace the influence of the human among the nonhuman?”
I had previously read Ghosh’s 2016 non-fiction book The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable. But it was his 2019 quote above that inspired me — no, pushed me! — to completely change the way I used a camera. Instead of creating images from my perspective (while hiding behind a camera), I wanted to know how the nonhuman beings in front of my camera perceived climate change, from their perspective. What do they see when they look back at us? What do they feel about our destructive behavior and disregard for nonhuman life? What advice would they offer if given the chance? I was desperate to give voice to these nonhuman beings threatened in the age of man.
This shift in perspective, from the human to the nonhuman, has profoundly changed my art. Since 2020, I have been working on two series of abstract photos: ‘Je suis fleuve’ (in English: ‘Becoming River’) and ‘If I were a tree’. For both series, I have adopted a phenomenological approach in order to embody the nonhuman beings in front of my camera. It’s their story, not mine. If we humans are to survive the coming upheavals, we have no choice but to learn from our nonhuman relatives who were here millions of years before Homo sapiens sapiens first walked the earth. And many of them will likely still be here long after we have disappeared. So it would behove our self-described ‘wise’ species to absorb some of the wisdom from these ancient beings while there’s still time. But in order to do so, we must first slow down. We must learn to listen. We must learn to ‘see’ viscerally with our whole bodies, not just visually. This is embodiment.
A beauty filled with dread
Since Australia’s Black Summer, I have become obsessed with finding non-visual ways to enhance the photographic experience, both for myself (during the creative process) and for viewers (in the gallery setting). Instead of ‘photographing the river or the trees’, I ‘become the river or the trees’ through sustained contemplation and mimicry – moving my body in sync with the flowing water or the wind blowing through the branches. I do this using the technique ICM (Intentional Camera Movement). All of my ICM images are created in-camera; nothing is Photoshopped in post. To date, all my ICM images are single exposures, usually 1-2 seconds long. Through this experimental process, I have learned to embrace chance and mistakes. Most importantly, I have learned to stop trying to control every aspect (sharpness, composition, depth of field, etc.) as I did for 25+ years as a documentary photographer.
I describe my new abstract photos as fluid and fleeting. My hope is that these ephemeral images provoke reflection on our own impermanence in a rapidly warming world. An article in a French-language art magazine here in Quebec described my new abstract photos as “d’une beauté pleine d’effroi” (in English: “of a beauty filled with dread”). To me, that’s as close to a perfect description as possible, not just of my photos but also of my state of mind.
Yes, I am filled with dread. Things do not seem to be heading in the right direction; there’s no sense of urgency. But I also refuse to do nothing while we collectively watch the world burn on our cellphones. I counter this dread with a more powerful burning passion: to dedicate every second of my remaining years (15? max 20?) to helping shatter the absurd illusion that Homo sapiens sapiens is somehow separate from and superior to the one trillion other species with whom we share this planet and upon whom we depend for our own survival.
This is what prompted me, in part, to question the environmental impact of my own photographic practice. I started to think about all the toxic chemicals in the inks and photo papers that are used to create the photographic prints for my exhibits. Even for those photos that were never printed, a huge amount of electricity is required 24/7 to store them on my computer, in multiple external backup drives, and on my website. Social media, email, charging camera batteries, and driving to locations also require electricity and energy. Then there’s the undeniable problem of how to dispose of photographic prints (they are not recyclable), not to mention the layers of plastic and stryrofoam that protect them during shipping. I could go on and on…
But it wasn’t until November 2021, during a duo exhibit with the video artist Anna Woch, that I became aware of an even more existential dilemma for a photographer. As I looked at my photos on the wall, a wave of queasiness came over me: I felt strangely uninspired by my own work. Or, I should say, uninspired by the way they were presented: as static, two-dimensional objects hanging against a flat wall, protected behind glass to ensure that no one would damage them. After standing alone in the gallery trying to understand why I felt this way, it finally dawned on me: how absurd it was that these abstract images of the rapidly disappearing ice on the Saint Lawrence River were considered untouchable, yet we humans are constantly meddling with and disturbing nature. Photographs are ephemeral, just like the disappearing ice on the Saint Lawrence. Why was it so sacrosanct to protect ‘art’ for decades if the world around us was burning down? What’s the effing point? On the day that I took those photos down, I mentioned to the director of the artist-run center, Philippe Dumaine, that this would be the last time that I exhibited my photographs in the traditional manner, two-dimensionally. I had no idea what my next exhibit would look like, but I sensed that I was standing on the threshold of a new direction in my artistic practice.
A month later, I was sitting at the kitchen table of the sound artist Robin Servant, whom I had heard through the grapevine was collecting underwater recordings of the river ice with his hydrophones. In our early discussions, I had not yet developed a vision for the tactile three-dimensional photo sculptures; that would come much later thanks to the input of several artist friends. But when I first proposed this project to Robin, I already knew that I wanted to incorporate braille text into my photos in response to the rhetorical question “Are we not collectively blind to the impact of climate change?” After many iterations over the next 14 months and in collaboration with the local chapter of People Living with Visual Handicaps, we presented ‘La voix des glaces’ in February-March 2023 at the Centre d’artistes Vaste et Vague in Carleton-sur-Mer in eastern Quebec. Funding for ‘La voix des glaces’ was provided by the Canada Council for the Arts.
The response to this multisensory interactive installation, in which visitors were able to experience embodiment of the disappearing river ice by using three of their five senses — sight, touch and hearing — was phenomenal. According to the Centre’s director, attendance at our installation broke all recent records. Especially among the youth. The secondary school students in particular were most captivated by ‘La voix des glaces’. One of their art teachers showed me some of the artwork that her students created after visiting our installation — such incredible abstract paintings, full of energy, movement, and emotion. And yes, rage. It gave me goosebumps knowing that some part of my work resonated with and was internalized by these young people. This gives me hope. We can live with beauty and sadness at the same time.
A publicity poster for the interactive installation LA VOIX DES GLACES at the Centre d’artistes Vaste et Vague in Carleton-sur-Mer, Quebec.
I’m currently working on the conception for a new exhibit in 2024 or 2025 — my most audacious to date — that incorporates elements of ‘La voix des glaces’ but goes one step further. I’ll write about this in a future post.
Hope you enjoyed reading.
P.S. If anyone out there knows Amitav Ghosh, please thank him for inspiring me to experiment using my camera in new ways that give voice to the nonhuman.
Find out more
‘La voix des glaces’ — created by Joan Sullivan and Robin Servant — was exhibited at Vaste et Vague artists’ centre in Carleton-sur-Mer (Quebec) from 24th February to 31st March 2023. It was supported by The Canada Council for the Arts.
Les artistes remercient le Conseil des arts du Canada de son soutien financier, et tous ses partneraires pour l’appui précieux : Centre d’artistes Vaste et Vague, Centre VU, Engramme et La Chambre Blanche. / The artists thank the Canada Council for the Arts for its financial support, and all its partners for their valuable support: Center d’artistes Vaste et Vague, Center VU, Engramme and La Chambre Blanche.
A photographer, writer and farmer who focuses on climate change and whose abstract, phenomenological approach to photography expresses her ecoanxiety and gives voice to the nonhuman.
We would like to invite you to the next FIA Live Performance Webinar on Green Production, on November 30, from 6pm to 8pm CET.
Conceived amidst the COVID 19 pandemic, the FIA Live Performance Webinars aim to delve into issues specific to the live performance sector. Following three webinars devoted to the pandemic and its impact on performers working on live shows, this new edition will focus on Green Production.
The climate crisis is one of the most urgent issues in today’s world, with every industry being called upon to prioritise environmental sustainability. How can the live performance sector actively contribute to the battle against global warming? Moreover, what role should performers’ unions play in this critical fight?
To answer these questions, we have invited 6 great speakers:
• Isabel Amian, General Secretary of SSRS, Switzerland
• Ian Garrett, Director of the Centre for Sustainable Practice in the Arts, Canada
• Devon Hardy, Program Director Canadian Green Tools, Canada
• Karrim Jalali, Industrial Official for Equity, UK
• Kristine Karåla Øren, President of NoDa, Norway
• Sandro Santoro, Project Manager at Les Bonnes Pratiques, Switzerland.
This webinar will be moderated by Simon Norrthon, President of Scen & Film, Sweden, and Vice-president of FIA.
If you would like to find out more about our speakers and moderator, you will find attached a document with a brief biography of each of them.
To register to this event, please fill in the online form available HERE.
Simultaneous interpretation will be available in English and French.
Nous vous invitons au prochain webinaire sur le spectacle vivant de la FIA, consacré à la production écologique, le 30 novembre, de 18h00 à 20h00 CET.
Conçus dans le contexte de la pandémie de COVID 19, les webinaires de la FIA sur le spectacle vivant visent à explorer des questions spécifiques au secteur du spectacle vivant. Après trois webinaires consacrés à la pandémie et à son impact sur les artistes-interprètes travaillant dans les spectacles vivants, cette nouvelle édition sera consacrée à la production écologique.
La crise climatique est l’une des questions les plus urgentes dans le monde actuel, et tous les secteurs sont appelé à donner la priorité à la durabilité environnementale. Comment le secteur du spectacle vivant peut-il contribuer activement à la lutte contre le réchauffement climatique ? Et quel rôle les syndicats d’artistes-interprètes devraient-ils jouer dans ce combat crucial ?
Pour répondre à ces questions, nous avons invité 6 formidables intervenants :
• Isabel Amian, Secrétaire Générale du SSRS, Suisse
• Ian Garrett, Directeur du Centre for Sustainable Practice in the Arts, Canada
• Devon Hardy, Directrice du programme Canadian Green Tools, Canada
• Karrim Jalali, Représentant industriel à Equity, Royaume-Uni
• Kristine Karåla Øren, Présidente de NoDa, Norvège
• Sandro Santoro, Chef de projet Les Bonnes Pratiques, Suisse
Ce webinaire sera modéré par Simon Norrthon, Président de Scen & Film, Suède, et Vice-président de la FIA.
Si vous souhaitez en savoir plus sur nos intervenants et notre modérateur, vous trouverez ci-joint un document contenant une courte biographie de chacun d’entre eux.
Pour vous inscrire à cet événement, veuillez remplir le formulaire en ligne disponible ICI.
Une interprétation simultanée sera disponible en anglais et en français.
ACTS OF RESILIENCE is a hybrid conference instigated by Two Planks and a Passion Theatre Company. Bringing together organizations and artists dedicated to outdoor performance, this gathering is dedicated to sharing knowledge and developing new strategies related to the climate crisis.
The conference will include sessions ranging from the practical (how are our conditions of work changing and how must we adapt?) to the high-level (how are our relationships with audiences changing and what are our responsibilities as storytellers in mitigating the crisis?). This three-day gathering will be held at the Ross Creek Centre for the Arts in rural Nova Scotia, and the initial strategies and ideas developed during the conference will be shared widely.
Registration will open shortly and will be pay-what-you-can. Please also note that all zoom sessions will be recorded but that individuals will not be required to have their cameras on.
The challenges the climate crisis presents to our entire society are undeniably huge and present in every community, workspace and home. This gathering of professional performance companies who work outdoors in collaboration with nature is focussed on our specific sector and the challenges we now face, from the practical to the existential. Some of the most important are:
How are our conditions of work changing? What new guidelines, measurements or strategies need to be put in place in order to protect the health and welfare of theatre/performance workers?
How do we communicate with the general public about the climate crisis and its impacts? What does that conversation look like?
How does our public profile change given how closely our work is associated with nature and, by association, an existential crisis? How do we work in that new reality?
What are our responsibilities as storytellers and community institutions in confronting the crisis?
Are the changes ahead of us a matter of gradual adaptation, or is this crisis something we can’t simply adapt to?
Many of our stakeholders create work in geographically remote locations without public transportation. What is the true carbon footprint of our work? How can/should this be measured?
How will accessibility to our work be adversely impacted by the changing climate?
What further measures can we take to further green our organizations?
This project is a response to an emergency. We, as artists who create work in partnership with nature, are overwhelmed by both the immediate impact of the climate crisis, and grappling with the longer-term ramifications for our relationships and communities. We must work together to share experiences, develop strategies and ask uncomfortable questions.
(Top image ID: Square graphic. At the top, yellow text on a dark purple background reads ‘ACTS OF RESILIENCE’. Directly below in yellow text on the same purple background reads ‘outdoor performance in the climate crisis. On the bottom is a yellow semi circle resembling a sun with a thin red border. Red text against the yellow sun reads ‘a conference at the ross creek centre for the arts’. Directly below that text in purple font reads ‘NOV 24-26, 2023’.)
The Canadian Green Alliance is a not-for-profit organization committed to bridging the gap between sustainability and theatre. The Green Mentorship Program is a year long mentorship opportunity for fresh grads, emerging artists or artists transitioning careers to be paired up with Green Experts in their area of interest. In addition to mentorship sessions, the Green Mentorship Cohort of 2024 will attend four exciting workshops on various green tools that they can use throughout their careers. The idea is to share the skills required by artists and technicians to move Theatre into a greener future both for their own careers but also for the general ecology of sustainability in the theatre industry. Each member of this cohort will also receive a $600 Honorarium for their participation!
Deadline to apply: December 1st, 2023
Julia McLellan, one of the Co-founders of the CGA will be hosting a webinar this month on Monday, November 20th at 2pm EST (RSVP at canadiangreenalliance@gmail.com).
The Missing Foundation: Culture’s place within and beyond the SDGs
Book now to join us online on 25 October 2023 for the launch of our thought-provoking new report on culture’s place within and beyond the UN SDGs.
The 2022 UNESCO Mondiacult conference classified culture as a ‘global public good’, reinforcing culture’s position in the global development discourse that is expected to grow as we approach the end of the UN’s 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) Framework.
This forward-thinking new report from edge and story, commissioned by The British Council, builds on our 2020 Missing Pillar report, which explored culture’s contribution to the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
There are multiple perspectives on what role culture can or should play in global sustainable development, particularly in the post-2030 agenda. This new report is an important contribution to that conversation, encompassing observation, provocation, and imagination. The report opens up questions about new frameworks to support collective action and encouraging cultural organisations to consider not just their contribution to sustainable development but the opportunity to be an engine for long-lasting change.
Speakers
Join us to hear insights from our edge and story research team:
Kai Brennert
Dian Ika Gesuri
Francesca Giliberto
Katie Hodgkinson
Pedro Affonso Ivo Franco
Event details
The event will take place between 10.30am and 1pm, including a short break. It will be live captioned and recorded.
About the report
In the 2020 publication The Missing Pillar – Culture’s Contribution to the UN Sustainable Development Goals, the British Council sought to present relevant evidence of their programmes’ impact and to position culture as a missing pillar in the wider debate of culture’s role in processes of sustainable development.
The response to that original Missing Pillar report and its resonance for a range of organisations prompted us to commission this further piece of research. This report is not only a dynamic follow up to our Missing Pillar report, it brings a cultural perspective to the debates about development initiated by 2015 World Development report ‘Mind, Society and Behaviour’.
Part one of this new report will look at more recent conversations in the culture and SDG field, exploring who talks – and who doesn’t – about culture in sustainable development, what ideas are being favoured, and what rationales tend to dominate the conversations.
Part two is an in-depth analysis of 10 British Council culture programmes and how they relate to the UN SDGs throughout their programme cycles, from design all the way to evaluation. The evidence will help us understand culture’s actual contribution to the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
Part three questions whether the SDGs are the best framework for culture to align itself to, situates culture in various other development logics, and presents an alternative hybrid concept for cultural actors to consider when working in relation to sustainable development.
We know our communities need better public places—places where neighbours meet, children play, and nature thrives.
At the Evergreen Conference, we will explore how public places can work harder for both people and the planet.
Public places make our cities. Amid growing social isolation, disparity, and climate change, public places are an essential service. At their best, they are magnetic, green and inclusive spaces and neighborhood hubs that connect people to nature and each other, creating a sense of belonging and a reprieve from the hustle and bustle of city life. We need to nurture these spaces and steward new ones that work hard for communities. The Evergreen Conference is a space for us to dream big, to imagine what our cities can be and to make the case for place across Canada.
Jen Angel, CEO of Evergreen
We can’t do this alone. Together, we can make the case for place.
Will you join us?
Making the Case for Place
The Evergreen Conference is the latest evolution of our annual national conference.
It is a gathering of urban thought leaders, community members, private and public sector innovators, and city builders that centres public places as cornerstones of inclusive and sustainable communities in Canada.
Key topics include:
Public places at the centre of regenerative and resilient cities
Sustainable and innovative approaches to housing urban populations
Supporting Indigenous experiences in urban places
The conference will be hosted at Evergreen Brick Works in the heart of Toronto’s Don Valley. While there are a limited number of in-person tickets, many of the sessions will be held virtually to accommodate our attendees from far and wide. All tickets are free of charge, but we kindly accept donations here.
Tickets to our in-person conference are now sold out, but you can still attend many sessions virtually. Learn more and register for our virtual program here.
Keynote Speaker: Zita Cobb – Founder and CEO of Shorefast
Zita Cobb is an eighth-generation Fogo Islander, Founder and CEO of the registered charity Shorefast, and Innkeeper of the award-winning Fogo Island Inn. Zita graduated high school on Fogo Island before studying business in Ottawa. Following a subsequent successful career in high-tech, Zita returned to Fogo Island and established Shorefast to put another leg on the Island’s struggling economy to complement its ever-important fishery. With an enduring commitment to Fogo Island, Shorefast is expanding its mission through its pan-Canadian Community Economies initiative to strengthen place-based economic development within the global economy.
Zita has been a Member of the Order of Canada since 2016 and was a 2020 inductee to Canada’s Business Hall of Fame. She holds honorary doctorates from McGill University, Memorial University of Newfoundland, the University of Ottawa, and Carleton University. She volunteers her full time and energy for Shorefast’s charitable initiatives and community businesses.
Creative Carbon Scotland is working with Connecting Threads and CABN – Creative Arts Business Network, and other organisations across Scotland to deliver a series of local assemblies for creative climate action. SPRINGBOARD brings together artists, cultural and sustainability organisations, climate workers, activists, local businesses, third-sector organisations and anyone interested in collaborating to form powerful local networks for creative climate action. Local assemblies are an opportunity to connect with other practitioners in your region to address climate change collectively.
At the Borders assembly, Creative Carbon Scotland and Abundant Borders will lead practical workshops, ending the afternoon with a discussion about where we take the network next to deliver creative climate action. Everyone can sign up for two workshops. These local assemblies are for anyone working or volunteering in the climate or environmental sector, the arts, screen, creative industries, museums, heritage, and libraries. Other local assemblies have taken place or are planned.
Programme:
12.00: Join us for lunch. Soup and a roll from Cafe Recharge and good pre-workshop chat will be provided.
12.30: Introduction on influencing and collaboration.The session will start with a shared introduction to how the creative sector can influence society on climate change, and share key-concepts for good collaboration practice and climate justice.
2.00: session 1
Option 1: Climate justice and arts & culture
Climate justice and arts & culture – with focus on land ownership in the Borders. Climate justice is a way of understanding how climate change results from and exacerbates existing inequalities and injustices as well as how climate action can help create a fairer world. Creative Carbon Scotland will be sharing our own research into how climate justice thinking is relevant to the arts and culture sector in Scotland. The workshop will focus on questions around community ownership, and the role of culture in supporting powerful forces of change.
Option 2: Land(ings)
With Claire Pencak / Abundant Borders
Community food gardens are sites for growing and nourishing community cohesion, multi-species collaboration and regenerative cultural practices. In working with plants, we are given access to their roots and to the community of soil. They take us down with them into the earth, opening up ways for us to become more earthly in our bodies, lives and communities.
Drawing on her experience as the Abundant Borders’ project worker for Duns Community Food Garden and her somatic movement practice, Claire Pençak will invite us to reflect together, through sensory and embodied activities, on how food growing offers regenerative processes and metaphors that can transform our relationship to land and to ourselves. What new provocations and languaging might emerge as we spend time together in the company of plants making comfrey fertilisers (dynamic accumulators) and tasting fresh herbal teas? How might ‘composting the ego’ nourish ecological relationships and support us to dwell more sensitively with the earth?
3.00: Break and mapping activity
3.20: Session 2
Option1: Arts and environmental collaboration on climate change
Collaboration between the arts and environmental sectors can create diverse opportunities for more effective action on climate change. This session will explore the ways that these fields can benefit from collaboration, offer examples of what has been achieved in the past and explore the practical steps needed to make collaborative projects a success. The session will end with an opportunity to consider what a collaborative climate change project would look like for you.
Option 2: Land(ings)
With Claire Pençak / Abundant Borders
Community food gardens are sites for growing and nourishing community cohesion, multi-species collaboration and regenerative cultural practices. In working with plants, we are given access to their roots and to the community of soil. They take us down with them into the earth, opening up ways for us to become more earthly in our bodies, lives and communities.
Options throughout the day
Swap Shop
CABN will be running a swap shop at this event. It is a free and local exchange where creatives can pass on things (e.g. materials, sheet music, paint, fabric) they no longer want, in exchange for something they need – a cashless bring-and-buy sale! For more details, check our website: https://www.cabn.info/2022/12/cabn-swap-shop-manifest-2022/
Project sharing table
If you have a project you want to share please bring materials for it to put on the project-sharing table. I.e. publication, flyers, art objects.
Mapping of creative climate action in the Borders
We will bring a big map of the Borders and ask you to pin down any relevant creative climate projects you know!
Travel bursaries
CABN have an access fund to support travel expenses to the event if you’re a creative based in the Scottish Borders. Email Julia & Jessie – hello@cabn.info for more info.
Accessibility
Everyone is welcome at our events.
We know that it’s sometimes difficult for everyone to attend because of unintended barriers. We want to make any necessary adjustments to our events so that no one is excluded. St Boswells Village Hall is fully accessible, with disabled toilets and wheelchair access. Please inform us of accessibility requirements during the registration process or get in touch by email if you would like to provide more information or ask any questions. Please contact maja.rimer@creativecarbonscotland.com at least one week before the event if you would like to provide more information or ask any questions.
Bus times for the venue: Get the number 68 from Galashiels Transport Interchange at 11.30, arriving at St Boswells Bus Stand @ 12.17 or coming from Jedburgh Bus Station at 11.49 & arriving at St Boswells Bus Stand @ 12.17.
You will be asked some questions as you sign up. We are collecting this data so we can understand the needs of those attending the event, share follow-up information and plan future SPRINGBOARD collaborations. We ask for travel information so we can assess the carbon impact of our events.
(Top image: Alt text: Black background with SPRINGBOARD logo. Text above reads ‘Creative Carbon Scotland in partnership with CABN and Connecting Threads while text below the logo reads ‘Climate needs arts and culture now’ ‘Join our local assemblies’.)
No one will feel the impacts of the climate emergency more than children and future generations.
Join us for this Green Tease on intergenerational climate justice and culture on the 11 October 4-6pm at Leith Community Croft. Together with experts in climate justice and creative climate education, we will discuss what intergenerational climate justice is, why it matters and how culture can be a way of giving a voice to future generations.
Children and future generations are at the forefront of bearing the burdens of the climate crisis. Still, they have little say over the decisions that will affect them more than anyone. Intergenerational justice argues that children have the right to be heard. That the climate crisis is a human rights issue and that climate action must reflect the needs and voices of everyone impacted. The complex interaction of the climate crisis with existing inequalities and injustices is an area where the arts and cultural sector can play a role in developing understanding and breaking down barriers to children participating in climate action.
An excellent example of this comes from one of our speakers Lucy Power, Co-director at Rowanbank Environmental Arts & Education. In the run up to COP26 they facilitated the creation of a beautiful and moving soundscape of children’s voices that you can listen to here: – Positive Imaginings Soundscape.
This event will partly take place outdoors so do bring warm, waterproof clothes. We provide tea and coffees to warm ourselves with!
Speakers:
Dr Elizabeth Cripps
Dr Elizabeth Cripps is a Senior Lecturer in Political Theory at the University of Edinburgh and Associate Director of CRITIQUE: Centre for Ethics and Critical Thought. Liz researches and teaches climate justice and ethics. Her most recent books are What Climate Justice Means and Why We Should Care and Parenting on Earth: A Philosopher’s Guide to Doing Right By Your Kids – and Everyone Else. She also has a PhD in Philosophy from University College London and a BA in Philosophy, Politics and Economics from the University of Oxford.
2050 Climate Group
Since 2014, 2050 Climate Group has been working to empower Scotland’s Young Leaders to lead action on tackling our climate crisis. They believe today’s young people are crucial to building a fairer, more sustainable future. Through their work, they equip future leaders with the skills and knowledge that they require to collectively lead Scotland in the transition to a just and sustainable society.
Lucy Power
Lucy Power is a Co-director of Rowanbank Environmental Arts and Education. Lucy has a background in environmental science and aerial performance art and steers the creative focus and output of the organisation. Together with Arran Sheppard she runs Positive Imaginings, a creative climate education project based on woodland performances, providing children an opportunity to imagine a positive future in the midst of the climate emergency. Positive Imaginings uses storytelling to empower and engage children in building hope and resilience for their future. Read our case study about the project here. Lucy has also been awarded a Churchill Fellowship to research best practice in creative climate communication and education from around the world.
Green Tease is an ongoing informal events programme connecting cultural practices and environmental sustainability across Scotland. Since 2013 Green Tease has provided a platform for those interested in teasing out the links between the arts, climate change and environmental sustainability through the exchange of ideas, knowledge and practices. Green Tease events are equally open to people from creative and environmental backgrounds and free to attend.
Accessibility
We want to remove barriers to participation in these events and are happy to make adjustments to prevent people from being excluded. Please inform us of accessibility requirements during the registration process or get in touch by email if you would like to provide more information or ask any questions. Please contact maja.rimer@creativecarbonscotland.com at least one week before the event. Please see our Safe Working Spaces Statement for more information.
