Climate Art Labs
2019-2020
8-day residency for artists, scientists and activists; 2 group exhibitions;
Slavske, Chernivtsi, Kyiv, Ukraine
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Climate Art Labs is an interdisciplinary project that connects arts with climate activism and climate sciences in Ukraine.
This project comes from a place of concern and care about our [lack of] response to the unfolding climate crisis. It also comes from a place of hope - that it is through art and cross-disciplinary conversations we can render ourselves response-able to the situation and collectively re-imagine and re-politicise our relations with more-than-human worlds, so necessary today.
The project consisted of the 8-day residency in Carpathians, where 16 participants (artists, scientists and activists) explored climate change both as a physical/ecological issue as well as as a complex cultural and political phenomena. During the residency the participants formed interdisciplinary tandems and came up with the joint projects they were working for 2 months together after the residency.
Climate Art Labs’ interdisciplinary artworks were presented a part of an exhibition Extraordinary Climate Movement (UA - Надзвичайний Кліматичний Рух) in Chernivtsi and in Kyiv during May/June 2019. The exhibitions were collectively curated by myself, Sasha Dolgiy and the participants of Climate Art Labs. With the exhibitions we have declared a climate emergency and published the climate emergency declaration.
✨Read the story of Climate Art Labs on Culture Bridges success stories blog (EN) ✨ read my take on art, activism and Anthropocene (and how Climate Art Labs’ cross-discuplinary works explored these on Platfor.ma (UA) ✨ listen to me talk about the project, climate change and art on Ukrainian Radio (UA) or read the interview transcript here (UA) ✨
Who made it happen
While I initiated and coordinated this project, it was made possible by a great number of people and organisations:
Organisations │ NGOs ITTA and Ekoltava.
Funders │ Culture Bridges programme funded by the EU and managed by the British Council in partnership with the European Union National Institutes for Culture (EUNIC) network in Ukraine; Heinrich Boell Foundation Kyiv office and Ukrainian branch of 350.org.
People │Core project team: Maryna Tsyhryk, Vasyl Fomenko, Oksana Tykhovska & wider project team: Olena Anhelova, Olha Boyko, Oleksandr Dolgyi, Anna Khvyl, Yuliya Maklyuk, Viktoriya Myronyuk, Olha Serhiiyenko.
The residency
We convened for 8 days at a very special and atmospheric place in the Carpathian Mountains in Slavske. During the residency we’ve delved into exploring the ecological and cultural meanings of climate change, walked through the winter landscape and shaped artists-scientists and artists-activists tandems.
Climate Art Labs zine (UA)
To read more about the project, participants, works produced within it and the organisers, flick through our publication below. It is available in Ukrainian language only at the moment.
Extraordinary Climate Movement exhibitions
Climate Art Lab’s project exhibition became a platform for a wider discussion about art and climate change in Ukraine. We hosted a number of public events and conversations: 3 curatorial excursions, 2 lectures on climate change from one of the project participants and climatologist Svitlana Krakovska (who also happens to be Ukraine’s IPCC delegate), a discussion circle on artivism and climate change with our partner civil society organisation Ecoaction (Ecodiya), and drew some links between climate change and gender topics with our finissage combined lecture and gig with our friends at Women’s Sound
Road-guide to creative climate-art partnerships (UA)
Building on our experience in doing Climate Art Labs and additional research we have produced a road-guide to creative climate partnerships. It outlines the value of artistic and creative cross-sector partnerships in the context of climate change, a step-by-step possible cycle of such partnerships, examples of such partnerships and some contacts of organisations to get in touch with for potential collaborations