The arts have a leading role to play in tackling climate change
Nicholas Serota
Cultural organisations are in a unique position to challenge, inform and engage audiences in conversations about the environment
‘The message is clear: everyone is responsible for creating a more environmentally sustainable world.’ Photograph: Steve Parkins/REX/Shutterstock
If we are to avoid irreversible global warming that will have devastating economic and social consequences for the world, “rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society” are required. This was the conclusion of a special report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) published in October. We – the collective “we” – have been given 12 years to arrest climate change. The message is clear: everyone is responsible for creating a more environmentally sustainable world. And the arts and cultural sector is no exception.
We have been talking about these issues at the Arts Council for a long time, and over the past decade have worked with the climate change charity Julie’s Bicycle to help arts and cultural organisations reduce their environmental impact. In 2012 we became the first cultural body in the world to include environmental reporting and action in our long-term funding agreements with arts organisations. Recognising that we had to create the conditions for change to happen, the Arts Council buttressed these requirements with a programme of support from Julie’s Bicycle. Together we substantially increased understanding about the role of the sector in addressing environmental issues and associated social challenges.
In February 2017, Nicholas Serota took up his post as Chair of Arts Council England for the period through to 31 January 2021. Previously he was Director of Tate between 1988 and 2017. During his directorship, Tate opened Tate St Ives (1993) and Tate Modern (2000, expanded in 2016), redefining the Millbank building as Tate Britain (2000). Tate also broadened its field of interest to include 20th century photography, film, performance and occasionally architecture, as well as collecting from Latin America, Asia, the Middle East and Africa. The national role of the gallery was further developed with the creation of the Plus Tate network of 35 institutions across Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
Nicholas Serota has been a member of the Visual Arts Advisory Committee of the British Council, a Trustee of the Architecture Foundation and a commissioner on the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment. He was a member of the Olympic Delivery Authority which was responsible for building the Olympic Park in East London for the London 2012 Summer Olympics. He is also a member of the Executive Board of the BBC.
Nicholas Serota was born in London in 1946. He studied History of Art at the University of Cambridge and the Courtauld Institute. He joined the Arts Council of Great Britain’s Visual Arts Department as a regional art officer in 1970 and then worked as a curator at the Hayward Gallery. In 1973 he was appointed director of the Museum of Modern Art, Oxford where he worked for three years before he became the Director of the Whitechapel Gallery in 1976.
Nicholas Serota was knighted in 1999 and appointed a Companion of Honour in 2013.
Term of appointment: 1 February 2017 – 31 January 2021
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son of mulder
November 22, 2018 11:45 am
Instead of consulting Feynman or Einstein or Heisenberg I went straight to Shakespeare and good old Titania from A Midsummers Night Dream has it summed up as she rattles on about Climate Change..
“Therefore the winds, piping to us in vain,
As in revenge, have sucked up from the seas
Contagious fogs which, falling in the land
Have every pelting river made so proud
That they have overborne their continents.
The ox hath therefore stretched his yoke in vain,
The ploughman lost his sweat, and the green corn
Hath rotted ere his youth attained a beard.
The fold stands empty in the drowned field,
And crows are fatted with the murrain flock.
The nine – men’s- morris is filled up with mud
Therefore the moon, the governess of floods,
Pale in her anger washes all the air,
That rheumatic diseases do abound;
And thorough this distemperature we see
The seasons alter: hoary – headed frosts
Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose,
And on old Hiems’thin and icy crown
An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds
Is, as in mockery, set. The spring, the summer,
The childing autumn, angry winter change
Their wonted liveries, and the mazed world,
By their increase, now knows not which is which”
Were it not for tragedy, the bards would languish in their art, for it is our unique suffering that sets us all apart.
A tale of all things well would be too terribly mundane, much better we would act out what is evil, or insane.
A purse of gold awaits the bards who wow the masses, that’s why each new disaster every older one surpasses.
⚜
“I have of late,—but wherefore I know not,—lost all my mirth, forgone all custom of exercises; and indeed, it goes so heavily with my disposition that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory; this most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o’erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire,—why, it appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours.”
Chris Hanley
November 22, 2018 12:26 pm
“In October 2006, Alison (not Julie) got on her bike to meet some friends from the music industry for dinner at a restaurant called Julie’s. That night together they dreamed up a vision of the future where festivals were powered by solar, venues were off-grid and covered in flowers, museums were community energy providers, artists were united as beacons for change …”.
LOL, why isn’t it called Alison’s bicycle?
That’s Britain where as adults they still live in a Teletubbies world:
Finally something interesting on the BBC’s science website:
“The key factor in the Plio-Pleistocene megaherbivore decline seems to be the expansion of grasslands, which is likely related to a global drop in atmospheric CO₂ over the last five million years,” said co-author John Rowan, from University of Massachusetts Amherst.
Low CO₂ levels favour tropical grasses over trees, and as a consequence savannas became less woody and more open through time. We know that many of the extinct megaherbivores fed on woody vegetation, so they seem to disappear alongside their food source.”
and:
“A transition from eating mainly vegetables and fruit to predominantly eating meat may have driven the evolution of humans’ big brains. ”
hm,… have your kids first, then go vegetarian.
That banner needs to say
What a Wonderful
World…thanks to
that miracle gas CO2
Bruce Cobb
November 22, 2018 12:51 pm
There will be theater galore at the upcoming COP24 in Katowice. The theatrics, the spin, and the emotional turmoil will be epic. There will be screaming, crying, finger-pointing, and shaken fists. And that’s just the beginning. Too bad there aren’t tickets to the show. They could make a mint. Now that’s Art.
Talented actors make great politicians. They are whoever fits the moment.
jorgekafkazar
November 22, 2018 12:52 pm
Unsatisfied with literally emasculating Art via PC nonsense and SJW garbage*, the climate change numpties, trougherati, and Lysenkoists now seek to deal Art a death blow by reducing it to mere propaganda. These people are all barmy in the crumpet.
* e.g., the feminista Star Wars billion dollar trainwreck
“….. where he worked for three years before he became the Director of the Whitechapel Gallery in 1976”
This is the latest art exhibit at the Whitechapel Gallery
(art can be edibly attractive)
Talking of arts and artists … a promising sign today from the BBC. They posted a science report about extinction of large fauna during the Pleistocene (last 2.6 million years) and they point the finger at CO2 levels; not rising, but falling. Decreasing CO2 – following glacial cooling – caused forests to transition into grasslands, depriving forest-dwelling animals, and their predators, of their habitat and food source.
CO2 not necessarily being the Hollywood villain with the British accent – that’s progress of a sort.
Charlie
November 22, 2018 1:46 pm
Oh, come on. Didn’t you hear yourselves, luvvies? We have only got 12 years. In view of the carbon footprint you generate, the only decent thing to do is close yourselves down.
I’m torn between “let them’, so that they look ridiculous for using fantasy/sci-fi to scare people, and wondering why someone doesn’t haul these bozos off to a psych ward for evaluation.
It’s been snowing in my area off and on since November 9, mostly 0.5″ to 1.5”, which comes overnight, creates a blanket, sends the female red-bellied woodpecker (beautiful bird!!!!) to my feeding station, reminding me that I need to get suet cakes for her and the hairy woodpeckers, in case they show up, and peanuts for the blue jays, and all the feather flockers are hungry because the cold came early, as did the snow. We may get the southern edge of a pending blizzard by Sunday, so I’ll be stocking the pantry, cupboards and fridge and freezer.
Now that’s the real world, the one that I live in, and that the rest of you live in. We do not live in cosseted, insulated offices with silly graphs on screens supporting the nonsense that the world is about to – dare I say it? – get an average 0.5 degree warmer.
I am more and more convinced that, aside from the looney-tune factor that figures into this nonsense, the people who do this are bogged up in some pseudo-psychological religion that they are unwilling to leave, because they get a massive rush out of it. Everything about what they say and do indicates that my assessment of them is close to the mark.
I think their funding should be completely cut off, including “arts funding”, and put into practical things like more efficient appliances that do the same job with less electricity, and increased food production. Also, a penalty or fine on US states like California that refuse to clear out fire-friendly fuels on state lands, because the Greenies don’t like “CHANGE”. I have a friend who is the head of his firefighting unit who will nearly spit nails about events like the Camp Fire, and what it cost in lives. He is furious about it.
These people are as close to nuts as you can get. The only thing that will stop them is a leading edge of a line of glaciers oozing south toward their offices.
Even then, they will probably deny that it exists. And that is the REAL problem.
old construction worker
November 22, 2018 1:53 pm
‘And the arts and cultural sector is no exception.’ and , just like scientist, when your paycheck depends on it…
John the Econ
November 22, 2018 1:59 pm
If “climate change” is the threat that these people say it is, society doesn’t have the slack to indulge things such as “arts councils”. People like this will need to be the first to go.
I’ve been reading Paul Hollander’s “The Many Faces of Socialism,” in which series of essays he describes how the state turned every last bit of everything into an exercise in propaganda.
All the cultural arts and plays, clubs, leisure time — everything — was captured, controlled, and turned into a contrived cultural desert, empty of spontaneity. Empty of life, really.
The Arts Council England description of their attitudes and intentions sounds just exactly like the joyless politicized drivel advanced by the concerned deep thinkers of the Soviet Union.
Michael Jankowski
November 22, 2018 2:19 pm
I had someone tell me within the past decade that the Cold War was ended because of the arts. I haven’t stopped laughing at that one.
Rich LAMBERT
November 22, 2018 2:34 pm
The arts already solved climate change. See George Orr and The Lathe of Heaven.
michael hart
November 22, 2018 3:06 pm
Opinion, Arts Council England
“The arts have a leading role to play in tackling climate change”
lol. Translates as”The arts have a leading role to play in bilking the system for cash in the name of climate change”
And English graduates like Steve Mosher are leading the way.
Pop Piasa
November 22, 2018 3:35 pm
Here is my reply as an artist, a final version of a reply above.
A Thespian’s Reflections
Were it not for tragedy, the bards would languish in their art, for it is our unique suffering that sets us all apart.
A tale of all things well would be too terribly mundane, much better we would act out what is evil, or insane.
A purse of public gold awaits each bard who wows the masses, that’s why each new disaster every older one surpasses.
LarryD
November 22, 2018 5:24 pm
“Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don’t mean to do harm; but the harm does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves.”- T.S. Eliot
Gerald the Mole
November 23, 2018 2:48 am
Imagine the fuss if a professional engineering body commented on a painting!
Peta of Newark
November 23, 2018 5:29 am
LarryD
November 22, 2018 at 5:24 pm
“Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don’t mean to do harm; but the harm does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves.”- T.S. Eliot
Thank you Larry, *we* all do know who that should be aimed at, don’t *we*
As far as I know/understand and engage with ‘art’ is that artists are kindly gentle folks who are actually very very brave. Brave in that they lay bare their thoughts and feelings and do so to a potentially huge audience.
In doing so they try to encourage ‘discussion’ and ‘social interaction’ and invite, obviously, criticism.
To most of the commentators in this thread:
…..Could *you* do that?
…..Do *you* have a new, original or potentially interesting take on The World?
…..or….
…..do you hide behind ‘science’ IOW= Appeals to authority and consensus
…..Could *you* put those thoughts into something tangible and thereby invite potentially vile and personally directed criticism? Could *you* take that?
…..Could *you* do or make anything ‘artistic’ and take the resulting flak?
So we see here, kind, gentle and undemanding folks laying their hearts on the line, and they get what?
Their point is missed, by several parsecs, by folks demonstrating how clever they (think) they are.
And *there* is Global Gas Gas Warming Radation Well Welling Change.
As far as I can see here, they are *not* espousing new tax, new regulations, how many babies to have, what food to eat, what cars to drive.
They are just ‘saying’ – and almost everybody cannot even handle that all the while claiming humans to be ‘social animals’
The Artists are trying to encourage and engage in being, in the purest sense, ‘social’
Ah no, they *can* handle social interaction can’t they?
Yes.
With a belly full of sugar and glass in their hands. Then they can handle ‘social’
But they know that that stuff is wasting them so they come up with ‘moderation’
Everything ‘in moderation’ of course BUT, *who* decides what is or is not ‘moderate’? ***
Please tell its not ‘science’ or ‘authority figures’ or, Lord help us, the actual consumer of these things while in the act of consuming them?
Are *you* able to do ‘socialising’ without a drink in your hand, do *you* understand how non-drinkers and non-drug-users even manage to exist?
Could ask Mr Trump if not.
***Lets give a nod 7 a wink to Charles ctm of course. (My son is called Charles. It means ‘Farmer’)
Tangent:
Did anyone see, while visiting The Grauniad recently that ‘”we are going to run out of (manufactured) Insulin within 10 years” – such is the rising demand.
Trendlines eh, ain’t *they* great fun?
Certainly for folks who dodge social interactions and imagine they know all about science instead. While miles high on sugar and booze. What *could* go wrong?
Endtangent
Vanessa
November 23, 2018 7:00 am
It is so exciting to see these people screaming about climate change when THEY expect everyone ELSE to do what they say should be done but THEY refuse to give up flying round the world, using their supped-up car to drive to the supermarket, using their ipads, etc. WHAT exactly are THEY prepared to do to implement their dream energy use ??????? How can you persuade anyone if YOU are not prepared to show the way ? !! You fail and your LIES are exposed !!!
Instead of consulting Feynman or Einstein or Heisenberg I went straight to Shakespeare and good old Titania from A Midsummers Night Dream has it summed up as she rattles on about Climate Change..
“Therefore the winds, piping to us in vain,
As in revenge, have sucked up from the seas
Contagious fogs which, falling in the land
Have every pelting river made so proud
That they have overborne their continents.
The ox hath therefore stretched his yoke in vain,
The ploughman lost his sweat, and the green corn
Hath rotted ere his youth attained a beard.
The fold stands empty in the drowned field,
And crows are fatted with the murrain flock.
The nine – men’s- morris is filled up with mud
Therefore the moon, the governess of floods,
Pale in her anger washes all the air,
That rheumatic diseases do abound;
And thorough this distemperature we see
The seasons alter: hoary – headed frosts
Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose,
And on old Hiems’thin and icy crown
An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds
Is, as in mockery, set. The spring, the summer,
The childing autumn, angry winter change
Their wonted liveries, and the mazed world,
By their increase, now knows not which is which”
Were it not for tragedy, the bards would languish in their art, for it is our unique suffering that sets us all apart.
A tale of all things well would be too terribly mundane, much better we would act out what is evil, or insane.
A purse of gold awaits the bards who wow the masses, that’s why each new disaster every older one surpasses.
⚜
Hamlet, as well —
“I have of late,—but wherefore I know not,—lost all my mirth, forgone all custom of exercises; and indeed, it goes so heavily with my disposition that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory; this most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o’erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire,—why, it appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours.”
“In October 2006, Alison (not Julie) got on her bike to meet some friends from the music industry for dinner at a restaurant called Julie’s. That night together they dreamed up a vision of the future where festivals were powered by solar, venues were off-grid and covered in flowers, museums were community energy providers, artists were united as beacons for change …”.
LOL, why isn’t it called Alison’s bicycle?
That’s Britain where as adults they still live in a Teletubbies world:
Finally something interesting on the BBC’s science website:
“The key factor in the Plio-Pleistocene megaherbivore decline seems to be the expansion of grasslands, which is likely related to a global drop in atmospheric CO₂ over the last five million years,” said co-author John Rowan, from University of Massachusetts Amherst.
Low CO₂ levels favour tropical grasses over trees, and as a consequence savannas became less woody and more open through time. We know that many of the extinct megaherbivores fed on woody vegetation, so they seem to disappear alongside their food source.”
and:
“A transition from eating mainly vegetables and fruit to predominantly eating meat may have driven the evolution of humans’ big brains. ”
hm,… have your kids first, then go vegetarian.
no offence meant, that advice sounds a bit dodgy, … no I didn’t mean that…
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-46306622
That banner needs to say
What a Wonderful
World…thanks to
that miracle gas CO2
There will be theater galore at the upcoming COP24 in Katowice. The theatrics, the spin, and the emotional turmoil will be epic. There will be screaming, crying, finger-pointing, and shaken fists. And that’s just the beginning. Too bad there aren’t tickets to the show. They could make a mint. Now that’s Art.
Talented actors make great politicians. They are whoever fits the moment.
Unsatisfied with literally emasculating Art via PC nonsense and SJW garbage*, the climate change numpties, trougherati, and Lysenkoists now seek to deal Art a death blow by reducing it to mere propaganda. These people are all barmy in the crumpet.
* e.g., the feminista Star Wars billion dollar trainwreck
The arts are running out of artistic themes? Could be.
More likely they’re jumping on the band wagon the only way they have available to them. But they want some of that money and authority.
“….. where he worked for three years before he became the Director of the Whitechapel Gallery in 1976”
This is the latest art exhibit at the Whitechapel Gallery
(art can be edibly attractive)
Talking of arts and artists … a promising sign today from the BBC. They posted a science report about extinction of large fauna during the Pleistocene (last 2.6 million years) and they point the finger at CO2 levels; not rising, but falling. Decreasing CO2 – following glacial cooling – caused forests to transition into grasslands, depriving forest-dwelling animals, and their predators, of their habitat and food source.
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-46306622
CO2 not necessarily being the Hollywood villain with the British accent – that’s progress of a sort.
Oh, come on. Didn’t you hear yourselves, luvvies? We have only got 12 years. In view of the carbon footprint you generate, the only decent thing to do is close yourselves down.
I’m torn between “let them’, so that they look ridiculous for using fantasy/sci-fi to scare people, and wondering why someone doesn’t haul these bozos off to a psych ward for evaluation.
It’s been snowing in my area off and on since November 9, mostly 0.5″ to 1.5”, which comes overnight, creates a blanket, sends the female red-bellied woodpecker (beautiful bird!!!!) to my feeding station, reminding me that I need to get suet cakes for her and the hairy woodpeckers, in case they show up, and peanuts for the blue jays, and all the feather flockers are hungry because the cold came early, as did the snow. We may get the southern edge of a pending blizzard by Sunday, so I’ll be stocking the pantry, cupboards and fridge and freezer.
Now that’s the real world, the one that I live in, and that the rest of you live in. We do not live in cosseted, insulated offices with silly graphs on screens supporting the nonsense that the world is about to – dare I say it? – get an average 0.5 degree warmer.
I am more and more convinced that, aside from the looney-tune factor that figures into this nonsense, the people who do this are bogged up in some pseudo-psychological religion that they are unwilling to leave, because they get a massive rush out of it. Everything about what they say and do indicates that my assessment of them is close to the mark.
I think their funding should be completely cut off, including “arts funding”, and put into practical things like more efficient appliances that do the same job with less electricity, and increased food production. Also, a penalty or fine on US states like California that refuse to clear out fire-friendly fuels on state lands, because the Greenies don’t like “CHANGE”. I have a friend who is the head of his firefighting unit who will nearly spit nails about events like the Camp Fire, and what it cost in lives. He is furious about it.
These people are as close to nuts as you can get. The only thing that will stop them is a leading edge of a line of glaciers oozing south toward their offices.
Even then, they will probably deny that it exists. And that is the REAL problem.
‘And the arts and cultural sector is no exception.’ and , just like scientist, when your paycheck depends on it…
If “climate change” is the threat that these people say it is, society doesn’t have the slack to indulge things such as “arts councils”. People like this will need to be the first to go.
I’ve been reading Paul Hollander’s “The Many Faces of Socialism,” in which series of essays he describes how the state turned every last bit of everything into an exercise in propaganda.
All the cultural arts and plays, clubs, leisure time — everything — was captured, controlled, and turned into a contrived cultural desert, empty of spontaneity. Empty of life, really.
The Arts Council England description of their attitudes and intentions sounds just exactly like the joyless politicized drivel advanced by the concerned deep thinkers of the Soviet Union.
I had someone tell me within the past decade that the Cold War was ended because of the arts. I haven’t stopped laughing at that one.
The arts already solved climate change. See George Orr and The Lathe of Heaven.
lol. Translates as”The arts have a leading role to play in bilking the system for cash in the name of climate change”
And English graduates like Steve Mosher are leading the way.
Here is my reply as an artist, a final version of a reply above.
A Thespian’s Reflections
Were it not for tragedy, the bards would languish in their art, for it is our unique suffering that sets us all apart.
A tale of all things well would be too terribly mundane, much better we would act out what is evil, or insane.
A purse of public gold awaits each bard who wows the masses, that’s why each new disaster every older one surpasses.
“Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don’t mean to do harm; but the harm does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves.”- T.S. Eliot
Imagine the fuss if a professional engineering body commented on a painting!
Thank you Larry, *we* all do know who that should be aimed at, don’t *we*
As far as I know/understand and engage with ‘art’ is that artists are kindly gentle folks who are actually very very brave. Brave in that they lay bare their thoughts and feelings and do so to a potentially huge audience.
In doing so they try to encourage ‘discussion’ and ‘social interaction’ and invite, obviously, criticism.
To most of the commentators in this thread:
…..Could *you* do that?
…..Do *you* have a new, original or potentially interesting take on The World?
…..or….
…..do you hide behind ‘science’ IOW= Appeals to authority and consensus
…..Could *you* put those thoughts into something tangible and thereby invite potentially vile and personally directed criticism? Could *you* take that?
…..Could *you* do or make anything ‘artistic’ and take the resulting flak?
So we see here, kind, gentle and undemanding folks laying their hearts on the line, and they get what?
Their point is missed, by several parsecs, by folks demonstrating how clever they (think) they are.
And *there* is Global Gas Gas Warming Radation Well Welling Change.
As far as I can see here, they are *not* espousing new tax, new regulations, how many babies to have, what food to eat, what cars to drive.
They are just ‘saying’ – and almost everybody cannot even handle that all the while claiming humans to be ‘social animals’
The Artists are trying to encourage and engage in being, in the purest sense, ‘social’
Ah no, they *can* handle social interaction can’t they?
Yes.
With a belly full of sugar and glass in their hands. Then they can handle ‘social’
But they know that that stuff is wasting them so they come up with ‘moderation’
Everything ‘in moderation’ of course BUT, *who* decides what is or is not ‘moderate’? ***
Please tell its not ‘science’ or ‘authority figures’ or, Lord help us, the actual consumer of these things while in the act of consuming them?
Are *you* able to do ‘socialising’ without a drink in your hand, do *you* understand how non-drinkers and non-drug-users even manage to exist?
Could ask Mr Trump if not.
***Lets give a nod 7 a wink to Charles ctm of course. (My son is called Charles. It means ‘Farmer’)
Tangent:
Did anyone see, while visiting The Grauniad recently that ‘”we are going to run out of (manufactured) Insulin within 10 years” – such is the rising demand.
Trendlines eh, ain’t *they* great fun?
Certainly for folks who dodge social interactions and imagine they know all about science instead. While miles high on sugar and booze. What *could* go wrong?
Endtangent
It is so exciting to see these people screaming about climate change when THEY expect everyone ELSE to do what they say should be done but THEY refuse to give up flying round the world, using their supped-up car to drive to the supermarket, using their ipads, etc. WHAT exactly are THEY prepared to do to implement their dream energy use ??????? How can you persuade anyone if YOU are not prepared to show the way ? !! You fail and your LIES are exposed !!!