news

New Publishing Tool!

Creative Green Tools, news

We are excited to share that the Centre for Sustainable Practice in the Arts (CSPA), with the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and guidance from New Society Publishers and ECW Press, has launched a new feature in the Creative Green Tools Canada (CG Tools)— the Publishing Tool.

What is the new Publishing Tool?

The “Publishing” footprint tool is a new addition to CG Tools designed to simplify the process of estimating the carbon footprint of book runs.

What can it measure?

The Publishing Tool tracks:

  • Production materials (paper, cover stock)
  • Transportation emissions (from production to distribution)

It also supports the input of custom emissions data received from a lifecycle footprint analysis (LCA), to keep everything in one place.

How does it support your publishing goals?

With the Publishing Tool, users can:

  • Compare the carbon footprint of different scenarios associated with your choices of materials, and different types of transportation for production and distribution.
  • Explore other footprinting options within the CG Tools to test the impact of your book tours and office operations.

How was the tool developed?

The new publishing footprint option in the CG Tools is a simplified version of the life cycle analysis (LCA) found in The Book Carbon Footprint Calculator 1.0, a detailed lifecycle analysis tool created through a collaboration between New Society Publishers and ECW Press.

The CSPA acknowledges the invaluable contributions of Jen Knoch from ECW Press and EJ Hurst from New Society Publishers, who have supported the development of this new tool as part of our advisory committee since January 2024. Their expertise and guidance have helped shape the Publishing Tool into a user-friendly resource that stays true to its core purpose of tracking, while also making it more accessible for publishers.

Ready to get started?

You’ll need basic information like:

  1. Book size and paper details
  2. Transportation distances and methods

Starting February 3rd, you can access the publishing tool in 3 steps:

  1. Create or log in to your CG Tools account.
  2. Create a new project.
  3. Select “Publishing” as the area you want to track.

Access the tools here!

Find all our Fireside Chats on Mighty Networks!

Fireside Chats, news

The Fireside Chats emerged from a desire to learn from Indigenous voices. These chats have been created in partnership with our friends at @naheyawin and the support of our amazing guests. Each chat stems from the shared excitement and passion of all of us to engage in meaningful conversations around sustainable practice that both inspire and educate.

We would love to see you join the chats. However, we understand not everyone will be able to join live.
That’s why we have created this space where you can access the recordings anytime!

Access the recordings on Mighty Networks here!

Sign up for our newsletter to know about our next live Fireside Chat!

Call for participants!

CSPA, news

Are you interested in exploring how the arts and culture sector can respond to climate-related disasters and be resilient in the long term?


Thanks to the generous support of the Canada Council for the Arts, we’re inviting Canadian arts and culture organizations of all kinds to help us develop a climate adaptation and disaster risk mitigation framework tailored to the sector!


We’re seeking representatives from arts and culture organizations to participate in a collaborative workshop at the Ross Creek Centre for the Arts in May 2025 and to test the resulting framework in fall 2025.


Travel costs and accommodation to the workshop will be covered, and participants will receive a $1,000 honorarium for their time and expertise.


Applications will be open until February 3rd, 2025.


Follow the link in bio for more information and to submit an application.


For more information and to submit your application click here.


For questions, please contact Emily at emily@sustainablepractice.org


Help us build a stronger, more resilient future for the arts!

Vous souhaitez explorer comment le secteur des arts et de la culture peut répondre aux catastrophes liées au climat et devenir plus résilient sur le long terme ?


Grâce au généreux soutien du Conseil des arts du Canada, nous invitons les organismes artistiques et culturels de tout le Canada à contribuer à l’élaboration d’un cadre d’adaptation au climat et de réduction des risques de catastrophes, spécialement conçu pour le secteur !


Nous recherchons des représentants d’organismes artistiques et culturels pour participer à un atelier collaboratif au Ross Creek Centre for the Arts en mai 2025, puis pour tester le cadre proposé à l’automne 2025.


Les frais de déplacement et d’hébergement pour l’atelier seront pris en charge, et les participants recevront un honorarium de 1 000 $ pour leur temps et leur expertise.


Les candidatures sont ouvertes jusqu’au 3 février 2025.
Pour plus d’informations et pour déposer votre candidature, cliquez ici.


Pour toute question, veuillez contacter Emily à l’adresse suivante : emily@sustainablepractice.org


Aidez-nous à construire un avenir plus fort et plus résilient pour les arts !

Open Call!

news, Open Calls

As we enter the fourth year of the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development, the European Marine Board (EMB) is looking for two new artists/groups of artists for the 2025 – 2026 edition of their ‘EMBracing the Ocean’ artist-in-residence programme. 

The EMBracing the Ocean programme provides euro grants for creative individuals/groups from a wide range of disciplines to engage in a two-way co-creation of artwork in collaboration with Ocean scientists. 

The aims of the programme are: 

  1. Raise societal awareness of and embrace connection to the Ocean
  2. Inspire positive behaviour towards sustainability
  3. Contribute new insight and/or perspectives to science

The programme is open to creative individuals/groups from a wide variety of artistic disciplines. Both emerging and established artists will be considered by the committee. Prior experience in co-creation with scientists and/or communities and working on sustainability topics is desirable.

Applications are welcome from across the world, and from a wide range of creative disciplines, including but not limited to:

  • visual arts (e.g. drawing, painting, filmmaking, photography, sculpting, digital arts, installation art);
  • literary arts (e.g. fiction, drama, poetry, storytelling);
  • performing arts (e.g. dance, music, theatre); and
  • traditional and indigenous arts.

More information on the call and how to apply is available on the EMB website: https://www.marineboard.eu/open-calls.

Artists and scientists looking for collaborators to develop proposals with can post on the Ocean Decade art-science networking group. 

For any questions please email Britt Alexander at the EMB Secretariat (balexander@marineboard.eu)

Holiday Closure Notice

CSPA, news

Nous sommes fermés pour le temps des fêtes!

Holiday Closure Notice: The CSPA will be closed on Monday, December 23rd, 2024 – January 3rd, 2025. Reopening on January 4th, 2025. 

Avis de fermeture pour les fêtes: Le CSPA sera fermé lundi 23 décembre jusqu’au 3 janvier 2025. Réouverture le lundi 4 janvier 2025.

As the winter break approaches, we want to thank you!

Whether you’re taking part in our programs, exploring our free courses, reading our publications, or following along on our journey this year—thank you for being here.

We wish you a wonderful start to the year! We can’t wait to share our upcoming projects with you!

Alors que les vacances d’hiver approchent, nous tenons à vous remercier !

Que vous participiez à nos programmes, exploriez nos cours gratuits, lisiez nos publications ou suiviez notre parcours lors de cette année — merci d’être là.

Nous vous souhaitons un merveilleux début d’année! Et avons hâte de vous partager nos prochains projets!

Submissions to the CSPA Quarterly Q46

news

  • Expressions of interest by 3rd January 2025
  • Contributions to be delivered by 31 March 2025
  • View to publishing in the second quarter of 2025

About the CSPA Quarterly publication:

The CSPA Quarterly is a publication meant to give a longer format and deeper space to explore and reflect the myriad ways in which sustainability in the arts is discussed, approached and practiced.

The publication features reviews, interviews, features, artist pages, essays, reflections and photos. It is a snapshot of a moment in time, a look at the many discussions in sustainability and the arts through the lens of a particular theme.

You can check our previous issues here.

About the CSPA Quarterly Q46 thematic guideline:

Responding to our present biospheric challenges requires urgent revisions to conceptions of what constitutes the good life. Efforts are often hampered by the catastrophist, doomist, and anxiety-invoking affects triggered by the topic. Imperatives for ‘joyful’ climate activism endeavour to counter these challenges, although the label of the joyless environmentalist persists (Losada 2020).

Positive psychologists and historians of emotion identify joy as ‘the least studied positive emotion’ (Emmons 2020: 1). Philosophers and theologians of Western culture comment on joy in the divine, tragic, and erotic in literature and scripture, identifying a fleeting and unpredictable response-feeling that has been deployed to ideological and political ends, and an emotion that can be consciously nurtured in the face of adversity and injustice (Potkay 2007). Projects on feminist, Black, and queer joy sit alongside trauma rather than offering counternarratives, while some make ‘killing’ joy a political mission (Ahmed 2023).

Mindfulness and wellbeing industries urge us to ‘find joy in small things’ to persist under capitalism. In environmentalisms, joy can sometimes infer awestruck, reverent, pious or sanctimonious nature responses. Likewise, joy emerges from the frivolous, ironic, or camp ‘bad environmentalism’ invoked by Nicole Seymour (2018). How does joy’s ambivalence, along with its potential to strengthen social connectivity and attachment to life, feature in cultural responses to environmental crisis?

Expressions of interest by 3rd January 2025

Email submissions to evelyn@sustainablepractice.org with the following in the body of the email:

  • Name of the author(s).
  • Author(s) contact information: email
  • Short bio (approx. 50 words)
  • Short outline of your proposed contribution (short form 5/600 words, longer form 1000-2000 words, series of images etc.)

If you have any questions, please email evelyn@sustainablepractice.org

We are back! 

CSPA, news

Dear Friends and Supporters,

We’ve been able to resolve our situation and we are in the process of restoring our services. 

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this might have caused and deeply appreciate your understanding.

You can always help us by advocating for the support of the Creative Green Tools with your funders. 

If you have any questions, please send us an email to contact@sustainablepractice.org

Thank you for your continued support of our work.

Sincerely, 

The CSPA Team

Slow Touring Project – Transforming the Touring Sector: A Learning Series (ONLINE)

CSPA Convergence, news

Register for the Slow Touring Project!

Slow Touring Project presents Transforming the Touring Sector: A Learning Series

The workshops will take place on zoom, once a month from October – March.

First free workshop: Radical Hospitality – Monday, Oct 28 – 1-3pm

How can presenters and their communities be the best possible hosts to artists and audiences – especially those with marginalized identities? How can visiting artists be good guests and connect meaningfully with the places they visit?

Featuring special guests: Franco Boni, Kevin Wong, and Lori Marchand.

Consider inviting anyone on your staff who does direct liaising with artists.

If you need accessibility, interpretation or any other support services, please let their team know.

Click here to register

We would love to see you there!

Green Citizen Symposium – “Thrive and Transform: A Resilient Journey” (ONLINE)

CSPA Convergence, news

Join the Green Citizen Symposium, registration is now open!

Be part of the Green Citizen Symposium, a dynamic three-day online event!

This year’s theme “Thrive and Transform: A Resilient Journey” focuses on how individuals and communities adapt and flourish amidst ecological changes.

There will be six sessions, each featuring a keynote and a workshop. One of the keynotes of the event will be Ian Garret, the director of the CSPA!

Ian will delve into the theme of “Climate is our Culture,” emphasizing that while there are numerous climate solutions for a sustainable future on the table, action is ultimately a cultural issue.

Link to the event page and registration