World Artists

Call for participants: Case Pyhäjoki – Artistic reflections on nuclear influence

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nuclearCase Pyhäjoki – Artistic reflections on nuclear influence
Transdisciplinary expedition, production workshop and events

Location: Pyhäjoki, Finland
Time: 31.7. – 12.8.2013
For whom: artists, activists, scientists, thinkers and doers + everything or opinion in between.
Deadline to apply: 5.5.2013

‘Case Pyhäjoki: Artistic reflections on nuclear influence’ is a transdisciplinary artistic expedition, production workshop and presentation events in Pyhäjoki, North Ostrobothnia, Finland 31st of July to 12th of August 2013. The sixth nuclear power plant of Finland is planned to be built at Hanhikivi Cape in Pyhäjoki.

The aim of the project is to explore artistic perspectives on the vast changes planned in Pyhäjoki, through the planning of a nuclear power plant at the site, and this way of considering energy production and consuming in the world. Artists can not only reflect upon and depict social phenomena and socio-economical relations, but can also situate themselves in between politics, activism and science. Can art make changes? If so, what would be the creative tools of activism? Life itself has become increasingly politicised in the new millennium and obviously this reflects on us all. There are plenty of art works that comment on issues seen unethical or wrong, revealing different kinds of world views. Also, there are community art projects that comment for example social condition that involve participants from different fields. But can the border in between art and activism be blurred more? Could it be involving yet aesthetical? Aren’t we all activists? What are other ways of activism in addition what we are used to think? And what is the change we are after? The nuclear power plant in Pyhäjoki is a concrete project that connects many aspects from NGO-activity, politics, local and global economical situation to energy production and consumption expectations as well as decreasing natural resources.

The local situation in Pyhäjoki, and the planned nuclear power plant, is a case example for the workshop. People have formed strong opinions about the plant. The small community in the area has divided into those who are for and those who are against the power plant project. The aim of the expedition is to familiarise well with the current conditions in Pyhäjoki and try to collaborate with the local community, although many questions may be raised with are not easy. What kind of political process leads to the power plant plan? What does it mean to a small, agricultural community like Pyhäjoki or Ostrobothnia area? What does it mean at the national and global level? Can nuclear power mitigate climate change? What are the alternatives to nuclear power i.e. zero growth or new means of renewable energy production etc? Pyhäjoki is an excellent case study during the times of continuing ecological, social and economical crisis of the different path choices which humankind can take in order to flourish.

The first days of the expedition are for discussions, presentations (both local, national and international researchers, activists and artists), getting to know the area and its’ people with trips and excursions. The rest of the days are dedicated for independent or group work that can lead to e.g. a project demo, plan, performance, artistic action tools, discussion event, intervention etc. locally or creating overall action structures that can be implemented elsewhere. There will be a final public presentation and if needed a small exhibition for demos, ideas and documentations in the end of this production workshop. The aim is to have something concrete in our hands in the end to continue the work in the future.

PRACTICAL DETAILS

Please send your letter of motivation to Mari Keski-Korsu mkk[-at-]katastro.fi by 5th of May 2013.

Case Pyhäjoki -project covers the participants travel, accommodation and per diems. There is also a possibility for documentation fee in the end. We will accommodate in a cozy Holiday Village Kielosaari and utilise some other spaces in Pyhäjoki.

The travel dates are 31st of July and 12th of August.

The selected participants will be contacted in May 2013.

ORGANISERS AND SUPPORT

Case Pyhäjoki was initiated by artist Mari Keski-Korsu and is now a collaboration in between artist-organiser and researcher Andrew Paterson/Pixelache, musician and artist Antye Greie-Ripatti/Hai Art and Finnish Bioart Society. Please read more about the organisers in the end of this post.

Case Pyhäjoki is funded by Kone Foundation and Arts Promotion Centre of Finland.

BACKGROUND INFO

The actual building location of the nuclear power plant is Hanhikivi Cape. 65% of the area is nature preservation with rich marine flora and fauna. It is also a rare land lifting shore where the land is still rising up from the sea due to processes of the last Ice age. There is no industry or energy production at the cape. The infrastructure for the nuclear power plant will be build as new in a so called greenfield location. Even thought the building of the plant will last for years, we are living the last moments to experience Hanhikivi as it is now. More information www.hanhikivi.net

The nuclear power plant is hoped to bring prosperity to the local community but there are still many people against the building plan. People are scared to loose their land, homes and all the risks the nuclear power production brings. Recently, the company responsible of the project Fennovoima Oy announced the plan to store the nuclear waste materials also at the Pyhäjoki plant, as the Finnish long-term nuclear waste material storage ‘Olkiluoto/Onkalo’ may not be able to store all the country’s nuclear waste. In autumn 2012, the German energy company E-on resigned from the Pyhäjoki Nuclear Power Plant project. It was the biggest investor in the project and was considered to have the best know-how of the building process. Other international nuclear energy partners have been approached to replace E-on.

The biggest town close to Pyhäjoki is Raahe and the neighbouring municipalities including Pyhäjoki have been very much dependent on one big employer, steel factory Rautaruukki Oy, established in Raahe in 1960. It was seen as an answer to economical despair after the local shipping companies declined, and now that Rautaruukki has been laying off people. Hence, the nuclear power plant is seen to bring new jobs and basically repeat the economic promise that Rautaruukki brought to the area previously. Another point of view is also that the plant can produce energy for the needs of the steel factory.
www.raahe.fi
www.pyhajoki.fi

MORE INFO ABOUT THE ORGANISERS AND PARTNERS

Mari Keski-Korsu (Artist, initiator of the project, organiser, born in Raahe)
Mari Keski-Korsu (mkk) is an transdisciplinary artist. She explores how ecological and socio-economical changes manifest in people’s everyday life. Her works have a political nature with a humorous twist. The basis of the work is in location, a place and people’s relations to it. Keski-Korsu started her artistic career with photography and then started to work with internet live streaming in the mid 1990′. This lead her to work with live video visualisations as well as net and video art, interventions, documentary, installations and location based art. She is interested in relations in between art, politics and science. The works has been exhibited in Europe and in several other countries around the world. She collaborates with artist groups, researchers as well as organises and curates different types of projects.

Pixelache (Contact person and participating artist Andrew Paterson)
Pixelache, based in Helsinki, is a transdisciplinary platform for experimental art, design, research and activism. Amongst our fields of interest are: experimental interaction and electronics; renewable energy production/use; bioarts and art-science culture; grassroot organising and networks; politics and economics of media/technology; alternative economy cultures; VJ culture and audiovisual performances; media literacy and engaging environmental issues. Pixelversity, its outreach and education programme since 2010, aims to be a ‘learning bridge’ between practitioners, cultural and non-profit organisations, interested individuals and larger institutions, and an outreach programme extending beyond Helsinki. Consideration is given to the relationships between the different activities, and how they may build up accumulative knowledge and skills towards future Pixelache events. The CasePyhäjoki project is part of the Pixelversity 2013 programme’s ‘Techno-ecologies’ theme.
pixelache.ac/pixelversity

Hai Art (Contact person and participating artist Antye Greie-Ripatti, director of Hai Art)
Hai Art is an artist ran international art platform with focus on contemporary art forms such as new media, sound art, environmental, ecological and participatory arts with crossover to science and education to intertwine international and local programs in Hailuoto/ Finland. The main activities of Hai Art include public sound choir KAIKU, international The Wilderness Art Conference, national and international artist residencies as well as courses and workshops for children and youth. Hai Art occupies unused spaces, beaches, a ferry, forests, fields and public spaces etc. in Hailuoto.
www.haiart.net

The Finnish Bioart Society (Contact person Erich Berger)
The Finnish Bioart Society, established May 2008 in Kilpisjärvi, is an organisation supporting, producing and creating activities around art and natural sciences, especially biology. The Finnish Bioart Society is creating public discussions about biosciences, biotechnologies and bioethics. Additionally it is the Finnish contact node in international networks of bioart and art&science.
The Finnish Bioart Society has currently 60 members, representing different art and research fields and other expertise – bioart, theatre, film, music, video, performance art, art&science, fine arts, media art, sculpture, environmental art, design, zoology, botany, ecology, environmental sciences, animal physiology, genetics, philosophy, cultural production, art history, engineering, etc.
www.bioartsociety.fi

Pro Hanhikivi Ry (Contact person Hanna Halmeenpää)
Pro Hanhikivi is a non-governmental organisation found in 2007 at Parhalahti village to preserve Hanhikivi Bay as a nuclear power free nature and amenity area. The organisation has 300 members (autumn 2012). Pro Hanhikivi activists collaborate with the officials both in Finland and in EU, organise Hanhikivi Days festival and other smaller event as well as try to affect in many ways to stop the nuclear power plant plan in Pyhäjoki.
www.prohanhikivi.net

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Invisible Dust

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Invisible Dust involves leading world artists and scientists collaborating to explore air pollution, health and climate change. The aim of this ambitious project is to produce significant and far reaching artists commissions in the Public Realm in the UK and internationally, as well as supporting the creation of new scientific ideas and engaging audiences with large scale events, education and community activities.

Founder

Alice Sharp has worked as an Independent Curator of projects with visual artists in the Public Realm since 1997. Sharp set up Invisible Dust as part of her commitment to involving Artists and Scientists in health and climate change.

Visibility

Our works seek to raise awareness of the key climate change imperatives and objectives now being tackled by National and International Governments, Policy Makers, Charities, NGO’s, Global Corporations, Investors and Consumer groups.

Visibility plays a key role in our trying to gain an understanding of the need to live sustainably and dramatically reduce climate change. Artists have many ways of making things visible and, particularly since the Land Art movement in the 1960s and 1970s (such as the ephemeral works of Richard Long and Robert Smithson) have responded to changes in the natural environment in a variety of forms.

Artists and Scientists

Invisible Dust first project was in 2009 with

and is currently working with the following artists developing new Invisible Dust projects 2010/12:

Artist and Scientist Dialogue Day Group Shot

Invisible Dust Dialogue Day, at The Wellcome Trust, July 2009. From back left: Karen David, Ian Rawlinson, Nick Crowe, Kaffe Matthews, Peter Brimblecombe, Paul Green, Alice Sharp, Mark Levy, Dryden Goodwin, Heiko Hansen, Mariele Neudecker, Faisal Abdu’Allah, Hugh Mortimer.

The artists are collaborating with the following scientific advisors:


Projects

The first of these projects ‘in clean air we fly’ by artist Kaffe Matthews was an Electronic symphony that engaged local Primary School children in Gillett Square, Dalston, London. 600 cyclists powered the sound installation to an audience of 1000 on Sunday, 6th December 2009.

Future projects in development include working with the the View Tube, East London, the Institute of Zoology and London Zoo, the University of East Anglia, Norwich, Kings College and St Thomas’ Hospital, London and Department of the Environment, UK (DEFRA), see New Projects

Background

The title is inspired by Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy in which dust is said to have a mystical role taking his characters to different worlds. There are many analogies with the great changes we need to make to live a sustainable future, most notably the need to travel without creating air pollution.  The organisation has been set up through Curator Alice Sharp collaborating with Atmospheric Chemist Professor Peter Brimblecombe, whom she met at Tipping Point, and measures air pollution through quantifying the components of dust through time. Invisible Dust is a not for profit organisation and has been awarded a Large Arts Award from the Wellcome Trust for ‘Invisible Breath’ for 2010/11.

Concept

Joseph Amato writes about ‘the visible world of dust.’ Amato contests that this informs our ‘perceptions of reality’. The invention of cleaning equipment and the modern day obsession with removing it has changed how we live our lives. Once dust was the smallest thing the eye could see, now our relationship with dust has dramatically changed due to powerful microscopic devices. For scientists, society’s transformation took place in the laboratory through the viewing of atoms, molecules, cells, and microbes; this also defined dust and the physical world for the first time but also our view of the human body and mind.

After the congestion charge was first implemented in Central London the air became cleaner than before the charge had been implemented but no one could see the evidence, it had to be revealed by subtle statistical analysis. On a global scale the ice caps are melting, coral reefs and rain forests are being destroyed.  In order for us to understand the consequences of our actions on the environment as human beings we need to ‘see’ the results. In his research Professor of Atmospheric Chemistry and senior editor of Atmospheric Environment Peter Brimblecombe from the University of East Anglia has discovered that children’s playgrounds are more polluted than the surrounding area due to the exhaust fumes from the parents’ cars at the school drop off. Professor Frank Kelly is also conducting research into how air pollution effects not only our lungs but is a cause of heart disease due to small diseal particles passing into the blood.

How can people understand their own effect on the environment when the resulting gases disappear into the sky? Since the industrial revolution there have been huge gains to society but also the creation of many of the gases that are now poisoning the earth. This project brings together artists and scientists to help illuminate these consequences and bring a sense of something human and fantastical to a very invisible problem.

Mission statement

The mission of Invisible Dust is to encourage awareness of, and meaningful responses to, climate change, air pollution and related health and environmental issues. It achieves this by facilitating a dialogue between visual artists and leading world scientists. Invisible Duststrives, through its creation of high impact and unique arts programmes, alongside new scientific theories, to create an accessible, imaginative and approachable forum and stimulus through which to promote positive public action.

Core activities

Our works seek to raise awareness of the key climate change imperatives and objectives now being tackled by National and International Governments, Policy Makers, Charities, NGO’s, Global Corporations, Investors and Consumer groups, by providing a physical and imaginative manifestation of the key messages and driving a meaningful response to them.

In order to deliver this, primarily we:

  • Produce high quality artworks in the public realm both permanent and temporary

Additionally we also:

  • Create imaginative linked workshops and activities for schools and community groups
  • Coordinate artists residencies in the UK and internationally
  • Organise conferences and talks and provide speakers for events
  • Support the creation of new scientific theories and  ideas

Brent Bucknum of Hyphae Design: a profile.

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We don’t have time to do environmental at that’s not functional.

– Brent Bucknum



In working on a Climate Clock for the San Jose Initiative, designer Brent Bucknam would often get into theoretical debates about the nature of art. His project partner, Brian Howe of greenmeme, would quote Picasso: Art is the lie that reveals the truth. Brent’s response was the quote above.

It’s one of the central questions of the environmental art movement, and one that is integral to Brent’s work with Hyphae Design Laboratory, a company he founded.

How can art save the world?

Artists on greenmuseum.org and elsewhere  are blurring cultural boundaries between art and science, science and activism, volunteerism and performance. Traditional forms hold fast, but functionality remains central to Hyphae’s work. Function: defined by this designer as “interpreting and conveying ecological information or serving otherwise as an ecological tool or system.” Hyphae is currently working on a project in West Oakland, a plan to line the 580 highway on either side with towering stands of bamboo, natural air and particulate filters. On a greenmuseum.org-sponsored panel at the recent Earth Matters on Stage Symposium, he presented a number of other exciting projects, from green roofs to living walls.

The 28-year old designer went to a farming high school. He worked for bioremediation and green roof companies before joining Rana Creek, with which he worked on the California Academy of Sciences’ living roof. He became that company’s first Director of Design before moving on to create Hyphae.  He sees his new company as a catchall, providing services from ecological design and research to consulting for artists interested in environmental projects.

That last aspect is the result of Bucknum’s own experiences making environmental art: he’d like to see artwork that ’s better informed by ecology, not, as he puts it, the “horti-torture” that creates living systems barely able to survive the duration of an exhibition. He’d like the art to be the change it would like to see in the world: smart, sustainable, and thriving.

Go to the Green Museum