Just Stop Oil climate protestors glued their hands to the frame of The Hay Wain by John Constable in London’s National Gallery on July 4th, 2022. Photo by Tom Bowles for Story Picture Agency.
The months ahead will see a number of new regular columns appearing here at Collecteurs. Among the issues we’ll be devoting attention is the aggressive advance of climate change and the relationship of climate and art. While contemporary art works have sought to wake people up to the urgency of the climate crisis for decades now – works like Katie Paterson’s Vatnajokull (the sound of) which allowed people to ring a telephone number attached to a glacier and hear it collapse was a particularly poignant example of climate art – more attention is at last being paid to the structural components of art’s implication in a culture of climate ignorance. We hope the new column, Land, Art will provide readers with valuable information about the ways in art and climate are colliding at a critical juncture in the history of the planet._
The last month has seen a number of climate-based protests in galleries across Europe. Protesters have glued themselves to masterpieces by John Constable, Sandro Botticelli, and a copy of Da Vinci’s ‘Last Supper’. It’s getting hot inside museums, and outside. This summer droughts have turned London into the dead grass capital of Europe, reduced the Rhine river to a level where ship traffic may be suspended, and large swathes of France are on fire. The climate crisis is finally becoming a felt reality in the epicenters of the countries driving its advance. It is perhaps a bit fatuous to ask what art can ‘do’ to help stop a crisis that is global in nature and implicates almost every aspect of human activity from food production to sports tournaments, to blockbuster David Hockney exhibitions. It is what the philosopher Timothy Morton has called a ‘hyper-object’, something so vast in its distribution and complexity that no single person can come to terms with it completely. While the handful of people who make up the ‘art world’ clearly cannot by themselves stop climate change, art disproportionately contributes to the problem and so it is appropriate to ask how art can help to find solutions.
Ultima Generazione climate protestors have glued their hands to Sandro Boticelli’s Primavera at Galleria Degli Uffizi in Florence on July 22nd, 2022. Photograph by Laura Lezza for Getty Images.
If one is honest, collectors are perhaps the most important people in the art world. They drive markets. They make tastes. They cement reputations. Their demands shape the ways in which the infrastructure of the art world is configured. What can collectors do to put climate at the heart of their collecting practices? As with climate change itself, the answer is complicated. As they say in 12-step programs, the first step is admitting you have a problem. The art world’s disproportionate use of air travel is the most visible face of the problem with various floating art fairs and biennales across Europe the United States and Asia all selling themselves as ‘must see’ events. Art is a business, so it’s not surprising that these fairs all want to maximize attendance but given that the actual purchasing market of art is so small, collectors can insist that these fairs meet or exceed emissions targets before attending. The Gallery Climate Coalition is a project that seeks to cut the art sector’s carbon emissions by 50% by 2030 – a target propose to coincide with the now quaint-seeming COP Paris Agreement. Well intentioned though they may be the GCC (not to be confused with the Gulf Cooperation Council, though there may be some crossover members…), the outsized levels of emissions per capita of the art world means that cutting in line with international agreements will likely result in a slower emissions cut overall. Few people emitting huge amounts of carbon must cut faster than the population at large. Thus, collectors should seek to decarbonize art fairs and events radically and sooner than even the GCC wants.
Screenshot from Gallery Climate Coalition’s ‘carbon calculator’
One innovation the GCC has brought that can offer insight is their ‘carbon calculator’ which allows art practitioners a means of itemizing their personal carbon debt. This is an enlightening tool but it only has use beyond guilt-production (the carbon impact of which is unknown) in so far as coordinated action comes from the awareness it creates. Thus, being public about one’s carbon failings is perhaps the first step to an industry-wide solution. As certain religious institutions have known for some time: confession is the first step to repentance. If collectors, gallerists, curators, and artists are open about the problem and how difficult it is to resolve, it may be possible to pool resources, to create an arts climate remediation project to make the sector more sustainable. ESG, equality, sustainability, and governance, was a buzzword in finance and management circles recently, though it has ebbed in discussions since the Ukraine war began. Still, it is past time to create an art sector ESG best practices guide that collectors can support and make fairs and events and galleries sign on to commitments to.
How would something like this work? If, for example, larger galleries could sign up to a climate sales pledge, donating portions of the proceeds from the sale of expensive works to a common pool galleries, institutions and artists could appeal to decarbonize that could be a positive step. Requiring art fairs and major auctions to demonstrate carbon negativity (rather than neutrality) before proceeding could also be a very positive step. Incidentally it might also go some way to simulating the search for local creativity in sites of fairs and events as shipping and logistics are a huge part of carbon budgets. Again, funds could come from a common climate resource pool, or arts councils could be lobbied to support and audit such pledges.
The world is at a crucial juncture in its history suggestions like the above are only a tiny part of an ongoing discussion, but it is an urgent discussion. If we don’t act now, everything art lovers value will be lost. This monthly column will seek out artists and projects advancing climate solutions, as noted above there will be no single solution for every problem but it will seek to find various potential solutions that can cumulatively redress the crisis facing us all. So start calculating and let us know if you have other good ideas to make art safe for the planet.