The Art of Climate Change

2 Degrees Festival celebrates art inspired by the most urgent issue of our time

 

What does climate change taste like and how does it sound? What can school children teach us about the future of the planet? Bury coal taken from several tonnes piled high at The Old Truman Brewery, and join Neoliberalism’s break-up tour...a distinctive range of curated events exploring issues around climate change.

 12 May 2017, London: 2 Degrees Festival, Artsadmin’s biennial festival dedicated to celebrating art inspired by climate change, returns for its fifth year from 9 - 18 June 2017. Featuring a bold array of performance, installations, creative sessions, talks and discussion for all ages designed to inspire, inform and provoke, the festival will take place across The Old Truman Brewery, Allen Gardens and Toynbee Studios, Artsadmin’s cultural hub in East London.

Enter a space with several tonnes of anthracite coal piled high around you. Take a piece away with you and bury it. This is the invitation from artist Daniel Gosling, whose art installation Carbon Capture, uses enormous piles of coal to symbolise all greenhouse gas-producing fossil fuels. As coal only damages the environment when burned, the intention is that every piece will be removed and buried by festival goers.

“Having toured the world in triumph for decades, playing to packed houses of adoring fans, the glory days of neoliberal economics are coming to an end. It’s time to find a new way forward,” say author and political economist Andrew Simms and playwright Sarah Woods in their new performance Neoliberalism: The Break-Up Tour, a whirlwind ride through our collective economic fate. Where did it go so right? How did it go so wrong? And how do we bring about a better future for our planet?

Soundtracked by a dancefloor mix of classic House and Techno from 1988-93, Kill Climate Deniers asks what happens when the unstoppable force of climate change meets the immovable object of two party politics. Australian writer and performer David Finnigan takes the audience on an explosive, cautionary journey through the dire state of Australia’s climate debate. We travel through via a Fleetwood Mac concert and a siege on Parliament House by armed eco-terrorists threatening to execute everyone unless the country ends global warming. Tonight.

What does a dying planet sound like? The brainchild of Disobedient Films and composer Jamie Perera, Climate Symphony transforms hard climate change data into sound. Spend a unique evening listening to a live symphony of found sounds collected from landscapes transformed by climate change. Or spend a day with climate scientists, sound artists and journalists to collaboratively explore and discover how to translate climate change research data into sound, and create a symphony of your very own.

Children in the audience are invited to join Ant Hampton’s CRAZY BUT TRUE, a funny yet poignant performance highlighting the effects of climate change. In an unrehearsed live performance, children assume the role of 'experts' and are given lines to repeat out loud via headphones, revealing a rolling list of extraordinary facts.

Discover what climate change tastes like by sampling a delicious spread of micro-food inspired by, and sourced from, local microorganisms. A to Z Unit, dedicated to uncovering microorganisms in food, have teamed with micro-culinary enthusiasts Blanch & Shock to create edible snacks from local micro-organisms altered by climate change.

Or step into the future in East London’s Allen Gardens with three woven sound installations to celebrate our environmental future and lament the past. Join artist Jo Hellier and turn your plastic bags into something beautiful, weave part of the installation and embroider new slogans.

Judith Knight, co-director of Artsadmin says, “The arts have a crucial role in exploring, communicating and taking practical action on issues around climate change and the environment. 2 Degrees Festival gives us a chance to have a vital conversation, together, about how we can create a more sustainable and positive future.”

2 Degrees Festival is produced by Artsadmin who are dedicated to enabling artists to create and produce bold, interdisciplinary work without boundaries, and supported by Arts Council England, TippingPoint and the Creative Europe Programme of the European Union as part of Imagine 2020 (2.0) and Create to Connect.

www.artsadmin.co.uk/projects/2-degrees-festival

#2DegreesFestival

Images: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/rrbshzqq8rmh95s/AACN7NxrHGuKgdCq_L9sS89Wa?dl=0

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Rebecca Ladbury |rebecca@ladburypr.com | +44 (0) 7941 224 975

Danya Agababian | danya@ladburypr.com | +44 (0) 7779 635 147

 

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