User:PhillipEGruenemay/Climate change art

Climate change art - Effects and influence additions
Climate change artworks differ in how they are interpreted by and how they impact the viewer. Laura Kim Sommer and Christian Andreas Klöckner (both from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology) conducted a survey of attendees of the Parisian art festival ArtCOP21 in 2015 (that was held at the same time as the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference) regarding 37 artworks within the festival.11 The responses led Sommer and Klöckner’s research to develop four characterizations of the works of art in terms of their content and the responses of the viewers to the artworks.11 The first categorization was labeled “the comforting utopia”, which meant that the artwork had given off positive emotions but did not inspire people to enact positive climate action.11 The second categorization was labeled “the challenging dystopia”, which meant that the artwork had given off negative emotions and greatly inspired climate nonaction.11 The third categorization was labeled “the mediocre mythology”, which meant that the artwork had given off neutral emotions and did not inspire people to enact positive climate action.11 The final categorization was labeled “the awesome solution”, which meant that the work of art had given off both positive and negative emotions but inspired people to enact positive climate action.11 The data collected by Sommer and Klöckner was categorized by them in 2019 into different psychological characteristics and connected these to functions of the brain to see where various emotions were triggered from observing the art and concluded that works of art that were not in “the challenging dystopia” category were generally more likely to leave audiences open to positive climate action, with “the awesome solution” works of art being the most likely of all the categories to inspire positive climate action.11

There are those that believe that education about global warming can be better delivered through an emphasis on arts/humanities education rather than solely through science education. Students who are taught means to illustrate the concepts of global warming expressed through art can show greater learning gains than by learning the scientific basis alone.14 This was illustrated by a study conducted at a public high school in Portugal by Julia Bentz (a postgraduate researcher for the Centre for Ecology, Evolution, and Environmental Changes at the University of Lisbon in Portugal) in 2018 and 2019.14 In this study, 70 high school students between the ages of 16 and 18 undertook two separate projects relating to arts and global warming.14 The first art project involved the students finding a small but impactful change in their lives that leads to positive global warming change and sticking to it for 30 days, where the data they collected was reflected in various group discussions and individual writing and art projects.14 The second art project involved the students reading global warming-focused short stories then discussing their takeaways in group discussions and producing art projects focused on specific topics concerning what they discussed.14 Bentz took first-hand observations of all of the various group and individual discussions & assignments and transmuted them into analytic memos that suggested that the above projects be used by teachers to more positively engage their students more effectively about global warming than a more fear-based approach.14

Various non-governmental organizations (or NGOs) work tirelessly across the globe to emphasize the effects climate change-inspired art can have to inspire positive climate action worldwide. In Australia, the NGO CLIMARTE aims for people to not just get the right information out through works of art made from the joint effort of artists and from climate change-focused scientists alike, but to enact positive climate action, opening a gallery based on such works of art in the Richmond neighborhood of Melbourne.18 In the Netherlands, the NGO Fossil Free Culture works to sever the linkage between fine arts organizations and global petroleum corporations, and to see that works of art that are critical of climate change get the proper forum to enact positive climate action.19 Based out of Yangon, Myanmar, but operating all over Southeast Asia, the NGO Kinnari Ecological Theatre Project (or KETEP) stages folk performative arts from the regional area with the intention of confronting an issue related to climate change decided by the performers to spread to its audience in hopes of enacting positive climate action.20 And in the U.K., the NGO Platform works to incorporate education into the mixture of science and fine arts by providing curriculums to schools that teach climate change science through various arts and literature-based projects.21

Arguments against climate change art's effectiveness
Journalist Betsy Mason wrote in Knowable that humans are visual creatures by nature, absorbing information in graphic form that would elude them in words, adding that bad visuals can impair public understanding of science.25 Similarly, Bang Wong, creative director of MIT’s Broad Institute, stated that visualizations can reveal patterns, trends, and connections in data that are difficult or impossible to find any other way.25

Malcolm Miles (professor of Cultural Theory at the University of Plymouth, U.K.) is among those who believe that art that is centered on global warming can potentially normalize climate inaction.26 Miles cites the Natural Reality art exhibition that was held in Aachen, Germany in 1999 as an example, which had a credo of needing to find original ideas for how to depict nature “’because the images of the visible nature it processed before have lost their validity’”.26 Miles similarly mentions the 2006 art exhibition Climate Change and Cultural Change that was held in both Newcastle and Gateshead, in northern England, which tried to be more direct in their climate advocacy by commissioning works of art such as “a montage by [artist] Peter Kennard depicting the Earth attached to a petrol pump, choking on black oil” and Water Mist Wall (2005), a video instillation by David Buckland that detailed his efforts to provide a carbon-free schooner ride to the artic to see first-hand the melting glaciers and icebergs caused by global warming.26  These intense visual displays led to a numbing effect among audience members, which led not to positive climate action but to climate inaction.26

Miles also argues that art that is centered on global warming might be more truly centered on singularly moving forward the artist’s feeling of self-representation and not propagating concrete positive change about global warming, that these works of art can only potentially spread awareness and nothing more.26 The history of ‘found objects’ as art that started in the Dadaist movement of modern art in the early 20th Century has transitioned in more recent years into “the art [sculptures] of natural conservation of Andy Goldsworthy”, which comments on how modern landscapes are less focused on the natural aspects of an environment but more so on human interaction within an environment such as “war memorials” and “country walking”.26  Miles mentions that the majority of people who see Goldsworthy’s work do not see them in-person – and outdoors – but through photos found in books, websites, and gallery shows.26 Similarly, Miles cites the Groundworks art exhibition held in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 2005 that was curated by “art historian Grant Kester”, whom Miles quoted in saying that when talking about an artist’s relationship to nature that “’the artist’s brush can as easily resemble a dissecting scalpel as it can a lover’s caress’”; which Kester says is due to an artist’s need to be a part of the global market economy to sustain themselves.26

Finally, Miles argues that art that is centered on global warming that is also seen to be aesthetically boring or awful is more likely to lead to inaction than works of art that are seen to be aesthetically exciting or awe-inspiring.26 The reviews of Goldworth’s sculptures by David Matless – a professor of Cultural Geography at the University of Nottingham, U.K. – and George Revill – a professor of Cultural Historical Geography at The Open University, U.K. – were done so not so much for their aesthetic quality – which they go out of their way to not comment on – but for their environmental advocacy are used by Miles as an example of this.26