21 February, 2006
19 February, 2006
ART NOT OIL 2006: CALL FOR ENTRIES
ART NOT OIL 2006: CALL FOR ENTRIES
First Prize: Justice
Second Prize: Survival
2006 looks like being another year when the gulf between what oil
companies do and what they say grows even wider. Iraq is still in flames, with hungry oil executives eager for the insurgency to be locked down enough to give themselves easy access to the privatised prize of its oil. Hurricanes, droughts and freak heatwaves are all gathering speed. And more and more people are noticing the seasons turned on their heads or nursing quiet terrors about what sort of destabilised world we’re hurtling towards.
So what do BP, Shell, Exxon and the rest of them dream up to keep us consuming instead of questioning and resisting? They pump their windfall profits into turning up the volume of the propaganda machine. Which means more and louder lying - sorry, “advertising” - about how green they are, and more cultural sponsorship. Why else is it that Shell has just announced that it is the proud new sponsor of the Wildlife Photographer of the Year Award? Could it be that it doesn’t want you to know about the systemic destruction in Russia, Ireland, Nigeria and wherever else it operates?
Making a living out of making art is tough. But in times of crisis, isn’t it an artist’s responsibility to create wake-up calls? To reflect our emotional responses to this scary political, social and ecological landscape? In the recent past artists often relied on government support, whereas now economic policy encourages corporate sponsorship of the arts. Any examination of corporate culture can leave us in no doubt that this will promote corporate values, and stifle any art which is seen as “off-message”. We’re all complicit in a web of ways in this dirty, dangerous system, but it’s too late to be complacent. We have to act. And we think that the greatest contribution an artist can make is to address the issues of the moment with honesty, vision, anger and love.
WHAT LIES BENEATH THE GREENWASH?
* Shell’s vast development on Russia’s Sakhalin Island will decimate local fishing and despoil one of the few remaining feeding grounds of the world’s last 100 Western Pacific Gray whales. www.pacificenvironment.org
* ExxonMobil still pays climate sceptics to challenge the consensus that climate change is man-made and here now. www.exxonsecrets.org
* ‘Court Declares Gas Flaring Illegal In Nigeria’ (Nov ’05) But flaring still continues and Shell is set to appeal.
www.eraction.org
* Shell (and Statoil)’s plans to build a gas refinery and pipeline in County Mayo, Ireland, resulted in the 94 day imprisonment of 5 farmers, and triggered an ongoing countrywide (and UK) campaign.
www.corribsos.com
* ‘Exposed: BP, its pipeline, and an environmental time-bomb’ Independent(26.6.04) on BP’s US-inspired and protected Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil & gas pipelines, which will be a human rights disaster & produce over 150m tonnes of CO2 each year for 40 years, causing untold damage to the world’s climate.
www.baku.org.uk
* BP, Shell & Exxon have commitments to expand fossil fuel production by at least 3.5% per year. BP invests less than 3% of its annual budget in solar & other renewable energy sources, much less than it ploughs into advertising and sponsorship.
* 15 workers were killed and over 170 injured in an explosion at BP’s Texas City refinery on March 23rd 2005.
THE EXHIBITION
Art Not Oil is a non-profit project aimed at encouraging artists to create work that explores the damage that oil companies are doing to the planet, and the role art can play in counteracting that damage. Now in its third year, it's made up of an online gallery as well as a rolling exhibition which partly shadows the BP Portrait Award, so we invite you to send us your art. In 2006, as well as work that looks at the negative impacts of fossil fuels, we'd like to feature work that looks at positive visions and solutions, even though we know that's more of a creative challenge!
The exhibition will open in London on June 10th 2006, partly to coincide with the opening of the BP Portrait Award at the National Portrait Gallery (NPG). It will end the year in Aberdeen, where the BP Portrait Award exhibition opens in November.
Things you can do:
1. Send us your art!
2. Cut your CO2 emissions: boycott all petrol stations, stay away from airplanes, bath with a friend, get green leccy...
3. Take action on the root causes of climate chaos wherever and however you can, though especially at the Camp for Climate Action, August 26 - Sept 4 2006 www.climatecamp.org.uk
4. Boycott the BP Portrait Award and other similarly sullied prizes.
5. Would you like us to run a workshop on these issues at your college, workplace etc.? If so, it would be great to hear from you.
MORE INFO
This leaflet focuses on the activities of BP, Shell and Exxon, but other oil companies are no better. For more information on the impact of the oil and energy industries see:
www.risingtide.org.uk
www.carbonweb.org
www.oilwatch.org.ec
www.shellfacts.com
www.colombiasolidarity.org.uk
www.amazonwatch.org
Also, you could tell these cultural institutions how you feel about their acceptance of oil money:
snairne@npg.org.uk [Sandy Nairne, NPG, re. BP]
nicholas.serota@tate.org.uk [Tate Britain, re. BP]
jon.tucker@nmsi.ac.uk [Science Museum, re. BP]
info@barbican.org.uk [John Tusa, Barbican, re. BP]
m.dixon@nhm.ac.uk [Michael Dixon, Natural History Museum, re. BP]
tony.hall@roh.org.uk [Royal Opera House, re. BP]
directorate@thebritishmuseum.ac.uk [Neil MacGregor, British Museum, re. BP]
information@ng-london.org.uk [Charles Saumarez Smith, National Gallery, re. Shell, BP & Exxon]
info@nationaltheatre.org.uk [Nicholas Hytner, National Theatre, re. Shell]
HOW TO ENTER
Send us a photo of your piece, or a description, and we’ll take it from there.
T 07708 794665
info@artnotoil.org.uk
Art Not Oil
c/o 62 Fieldgate Street, London, E1 1ES
www.artnotoil.org.uk
www.nationalpetroleumgallery.org.uk
Leaflets, postcards, images & info available on request
Art Not Oil is a project of London Rising Tide: www.londonrisingtide.org.uk
Closing date for entries: May 30th 2006 (give or take a month or two)
Look out also in early 2006 for 'Art Not Oil - the [short] Film'!
“You cannot have ‘art for art’s sake’…art must do something...What is of interest to me is that my art should be able to alter the lives of a large number of people, a whole community, of the entire country...So the stories that I tell must have a different sort of purpose from the artist in the western world…It's not an ego trip, it's serious - it's politics, it's economics, it's everything. And art in that instance becomes so meaningful both to the artist and to the consumers of that art.”
Ken Saro-Wiwa, 1994
More info: www.remembersarowiwa.com
First Prize: Justice
Second Prize: Survival
2006 looks like being another year when the gulf between what oil
companies do and what they say grows even wider. Iraq is still in flames, with hungry oil executives eager for the insurgency to be locked down enough to give themselves easy access to the privatised prize of its oil. Hurricanes, droughts and freak heatwaves are all gathering speed. And more and more people are noticing the seasons turned on their heads or nursing quiet terrors about what sort of destabilised world we’re hurtling towards.
So what do BP, Shell, Exxon and the rest of them dream up to keep us consuming instead of questioning and resisting? They pump their windfall profits into turning up the volume of the propaganda machine. Which means more and louder lying - sorry, “advertising” - about how green they are, and more cultural sponsorship. Why else is it that Shell has just announced that it is the proud new sponsor of the Wildlife Photographer of the Year Award? Could it be that it doesn’t want you to know about the systemic destruction in Russia, Ireland, Nigeria and wherever else it operates?
Making a living out of making art is tough. But in times of crisis, isn’t it an artist’s responsibility to create wake-up calls? To reflect our emotional responses to this scary political, social and ecological landscape? In the recent past artists often relied on government support, whereas now economic policy encourages corporate sponsorship of the arts. Any examination of corporate culture can leave us in no doubt that this will promote corporate values, and stifle any art which is seen as “off-message”. We’re all complicit in a web of ways in this dirty, dangerous system, but it’s too late to be complacent. We have to act. And we think that the greatest contribution an artist can make is to address the issues of the moment with honesty, vision, anger and love.
WHAT LIES BENEATH THE GREENWASH?
* Shell’s vast development on Russia’s Sakhalin Island will decimate local fishing and despoil one of the few remaining feeding grounds of the world’s last 100 Western Pacific Gray whales. www.pacificenvironment.org
* ExxonMobil still pays climate sceptics to challenge the consensus that climate change is man-made and here now. www.exxonsecrets.org
* ‘Court Declares Gas Flaring Illegal In Nigeria’ (Nov ’05) But flaring still continues and Shell is set to appeal.
www.eraction.org
* Shell (and Statoil)’s plans to build a gas refinery and pipeline in County Mayo, Ireland, resulted in the 94 day imprisonment of 5 farmers, and triggered an ongoing countrywide (and UK) campaign.
www.corribsos.com
* ‘Exposed: BP, its pipeline, and an environmental time-bomb’ Independent(26.6.04) on BP’s US-inspired and protected Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil & gas pipelines, which will be a human rights disaster & produce over 150m tonnes of CO2 each year for 40 years, causing untold damage to the world’s climate.
www.baku.org.uk
* BP, Shell & Exxon have commitments to expand fossil fuel production by at least 3.5% per year. BP invests less than 3% of its annual budget in solar & other renewable energy sources, much less than it ploughs into advertising and sponsorship.
* 15 workers were killed and over 170 injured in an explosion at BP’s Texas City refinery on March 23rd 2005.
THE EXHIBITION
Art Not Oil is a non-profit project aimed at encouraging artists to create work that explores the damage that oil companies are doing to the planet, and the role art can play in counteracting that damage. Now in its third year, it's made up of an online gallery as well as a rolling exhibition which partly shadows the BP Portrait Award, so we invite you to send us your art. In 2006, as well as work that looks at the negative impacts of fossil fuels, we'd like to feature work that looks at positive visions and solutions, even though we know that's more of a creative challenge!
The exhibition will open in London on June 10th 2006, partly to coincide with the opening of the BP Portrait Award at the National Portrait Gallery (NPG). It will end the year in Aberdeen, where the BP Portrait Award exhibition opens in November.
Things you can do:
1. Send us your art!
2. Cut your CO2 emissions: boycott all petrol stations, stay away from airplanes, bath with a friend, get green leccy...
3. Take action on the root causes of climate chaos wherever and however you can, though especially at the Camp for Climate Action, August 26 - Sept 4 2006 www.climatecamp.org.uk
4. Boycott the BP Portrait Award and other similarly sullied prizes.
5. Would you like us to run a workshop on these issues at your college, workplace etc.? If so, it would be great to hear from you.
MORE INFO
This leaflet focuses on the activities of BP, Shell and Exxon, but other oil companies are no better. For more information on the impact of the oil and energy industries see:
www.risingtide.org.uk
www.carbonweb.org
www.oilwatch.org.ec
www.shellfacts.com
www.colombiasolidarity.org.uk
www.amazonwatch.org
Also, you could tell these cultural institutions how you feel about their acceptance of oil money:
snairne@npg.org.uk [Sandy Nairne, NPG, re. BP]
nicholas.serota@tate.org.uk [Tate Britain, re. BP]
jon.tucker@nmsi.ac.uk [Science Museum, re. BP]
info@barbican.org.uk [John Tusa, Barbican, re. BP]
m.dixon@nhm.ac.uk [Michael Dixon, Natural History Museum, re. BP]
tony.hall@roh.org.uk [Royal Opera House, re. BP]
directorate@thebritishmuseum.ac.uk [Neil MacGregor, British Museum, re. BP]
information@ng-london.org.uk [Charles Saumarez Smith, National Gallery, re. Shell, BP & Exxon]
info@nationaltheatre.org.uk [Nicholas Hytner, National Theatre, re. Shell]
HOW TO ENTER
Send us a photo of your piece, or a description, and we’ll take it from there.
T 07708 794665
info@artnotoil.org.uk
Art Not Oil
c/o 62 Fieldgate Street, London, E1 1ES
www.artnotoil.org.uk
www.nationalpetroleumgallery.org.uk
Leaflets, postcards, images & info available on request
Art Not Oil is a project of London Rising Tide: www.londonrisingtide.org.uk
Closing date for entries: May 30th 2006 (give or take a month or two)
Look out also in early 2006 for 'Art Not Oil - the [short] Film'!
“You cannot have ‘art for art’s sake’…art must do something...What is of interest to me is that my art should be able to alter the lives of a large number of people, a whole community, of the entire country...So the stories that I tell must have a different sort of purpose from the artist in the western world…It's not an ego trip, it's serious - it's politics, it's economics, it's everything. And art in that instance becomes so meaningful both to the artist and to the consumers of that art.”
Ken Saro-Wiwa, 1994
More info: www.remembersarowiwa.com
16 February, 2006
Autonomous Spaces in Athens 4-7 May 2006
We inform you that during the first week of May 2006 the European Social Forum will take place in Athens. At the same time the open assembly for the creation of the "Autonomous Spaces" / Open Public Ephemeral Zone will use a university space in the centre of Athens and will produce an ephemeral autonomous zone that will try to bring together all the grassroots anticapitalist, autonomous and antiauthoritarian collectives, groups and movements. We will try all of us to co-create an open public space that will give the opportunity to all the libertarian radical utopians, the anarchists, the antiauthoritarians, the libertarian communists, the green anarchists, the antisystemic Marxists, the squats, the social centers and all anti-hierarchical collectives from any lineage of the modern libertarian thinking -action to present their work, express their ideas , and come to public dialogue with the other collectives and the global society. This is an open invitation for all the creative political and cultural affinity groups and personal initiatives to participate in the construction of the zone and the formation of the social and political agenda. You can send your propositions to take part in the general program of the festival until 15th of March.
We would like to let you know that this congregation will give us the opportunity to create an antiauthoritarian autonomous zone and express our ideas in a friendly environment. It is also provided the ability to each collective to organize and decorate its own space, prepare and present its own lectures or documentary shows and participate to the general assemblies and forums.
We announce below the thematic issues of the assemblies and the forums and we wait from you the expansion and the enrichment of this catalogue with your own propositions:
*Work
*Immigration
*City movements and Ecology
*Suppression
*International Movements and New Technologies
*Social Centers , Squatting
*Direct Action
*Sexism and Homophobia
*Libertarian , Anarchist and Antiauthoritarian Ontology
*Contemporary Every Day Life and Future Social and Cultural Movements
*General Assembly :
Autonomous – Anticapitalistic Space and Antiglobalization Movement
The whole procedure according to the preparations until now will take place on five phases (more ideas can be organized and much more actions can take place through the expression of initiative) :
a) Autonomous Spaces / An Open Public Ephemeral Zone / Athens 4-7 May 2006
Four days of open public dialogue, networking of information, lectures, info-centres , books or pamphlets exhibition, live internet shows, film
shows and documentary video projections and open celebrative public situations
b) Action of Solidarity and Social awareness outside of Immigrant's Concentration Camp
c) Actions of Social awareness at the City Market and other Working spaces
d) Meetings, talking circles and workshops at the social centers of Athens
e) Total Freedom Street Parade / organized by Void Network
An open invitation from Void Network to all the anarcho-ravers, the technival sound-systems, the psychedelic trancers, the space travelers to
built a global celebration of social awareness in the streets of Athens that will send in all over world the message of the fight for Total Freedom
We believe that it would be very helpful any collective which would like to take part in this festival to prepare for traveling, to prepare their lectures, and to help with the publicity networking.
According to the economical difficulties of some collectives we can understand that some of them they can not organize the traveling in Athens, so we offer to them the opportunity to participate and express their ideas through books or pamphlets exhibition that they can send to the Creative Crew of the situation, or to appear in the situation through live internet shows, film shows and documentary video projections
We look forward for any reply from you as soon as possible.
Thank you,
People from the open assembly for the creation of "Autonomous Spaces" ephemeral Zone
contact:autonomouspaces@lists.riseup.net
contact for street parade : voidinternational@gmail.com
We would like to let you know that this congregation will give us the opportunity to create an antiauthoritarian autonomous zone and express our ideas in a friendly environment. It is also provided the ability to each collective to organize and decorate its own space, prepare and present its own lectures or documentary shows and participate to the general assemblies and forums.
We announce below the thematic issues of the assemblies and the forums and we wait from you the expansion and the enrichment of this catalogue with your own propositions:
*Work
*Immigration
*City movements and Ecology
*Suppression
*International Movements and New Technologies
*Social Centers , Squatting
*Direct Action
*Sexism and Homophobia
*Libertarian , Anarchist and Antiauthoritarian Ontology
*Contemporary Every Day Life and Future Social and Cultural Movements
*General Assembly :
Autonomous – Anticapitalistic Space and Antiglobalization Movement
The whole procedure according to the preparations until now will take place on five phases (more ideas can be organized and much more actions can take place through the expression of initiative) :
a) Autonomous Spaces / An Open Public Ephemeral Zone / Athens 4-7 May 2006
Four days of open public dialogue, networking of information, lectures, info-centres , books or pamphlets exhibition, live internet shows, film
shows and documentary video projections and open celebrative public situations
b) Action of Solidarity and Social awareness outside of Immigrant's Concentration Camp
c) Actions of Social awareness at the City Market and other Working spaces
d) Meetings, talking circles and workshops at the social centers of Athens
e) Total Freedom Street Parade / organized by Void Network
An open invitation from Void Network to all the anarcho-ravers, the technival sound-systems, the psychedelic trancers, the space travelers to
built a global celebration of social awareness in the streets of Athens that will send in all over world the message of the fight for Total Freedom
We believe that it would be very helpful any collective which would like to take part in this festival to prepare for traveling, to prepare their lectures, and to help with the publicity networking.
According to the economical difficulties of some collectives we can understand that some of them they can not organize the traveling in Athens, so we offer to them the opportunity to participate and express their ideas through books or pamphlets exhibition that they can send to the Creative Crew of the situation, or to appear in the situation through live internet shows, film shows and documentary video projections
We look forward for any reply from you as soon as possible.
Thank you,
People from the open assembly for the creation of "Autonomous Spaces" ephemeral Zone
contact:autonomouspaces@lists.riseup.net
contact for street parade : voidinternational@gmail.com
13 February, 2006
Super Size Wal-Mart
Lets hope that Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price can do for Wal-Mart (Asda in the UK) what Super Size Me did for McD's - click here
10 February, 2006
Hairy Upper Lip
dedomenici has called us on our fine moustache... but check out this picture we found of him!is this the kettle calling the pan black? click here
01 February, 2006
Manchester Zinefest
Manchester Zinefest is a celebration of DIY art and
publishing and suchlike . It's on Saturday February
11th at The Basement, 24 Lever Street Manchester and
it’s going to be splendid!
There will be workshops, panel discussions, zine
library, art exhibits, lots of distros and plenty of
zines to buy/trade/read etc etc….please come along and
have fun, be inspired, maybe get involved. If you want
to bring zines to sell or trade or add to the library
that'd be ace. If you have stuff but can't come on the
day then the bookshop collective can sort it out for
you. The art exhibition is open from today and anyone
is welcome to contribute by adding to it – just bring
a page from your favourite zine and maybe a few words
about why it’s special
For more information and a programme see our website
at www.manchesterzinefest.org.uk
publishing and suchlike . It's on Saturday February
11th at The Basement, 24 Lever Street Manchester and
it’s going to be splendid!
There will be workshops, panel discussions, zine
library, art exhibits, lots of distros and plenty of
zines to buy/trade/read etc etc….please come along and
have fun, be inspired, maybe get involved. If you want
to bring zines to sell or trade or add to the library
that'd be ace. If you have stuff but can't come on the
day then the bookshop collective can sort it out for
you. The art exhibition is open from today and anyone
is welcome to contribute by adding to it – just bring
a page from your favourite zine and maybe a few words
about why it’s special
For more information and a programme see our website
at www.manchesterzinefest.org.uk
Google Will Eat Itself
using google ads to buy google shares to give it back to the people, wonderful idea...
http://www.gwei.org/index.php
http://www.gwei.org/index.php
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