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Climate change: jeopardising art

Holly Downes soliloquises on the absurdity of climate change protestors’ methods

At long last, you’ve finished. The painting that was once a mixture of ideas has come to life; another one to add to the collection. After it is finished, you fall more in love with its artistic realm and the freedom and peace that it provides. And yet, the intimacy between you and your artwork can never last. Soon, it will share a room with infamous artworks and become the talk of the city. Critics will come sauntering in and stare at your painting, whilst you timidly await their reaction. As an artist, their lurking haunts your nightmares.

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But recently, an even scarier figure has appeared. They come in, throw paint, oil, food – anything they can get their hands on – onto art and begin chanting climate change facts to gobsmacked onlookers who simply wanted to admire art. They feign peace and then, suddenly, they reveal their coordinated Just Stop Oil t-shirts, ready to ruin the tranquillity of an art gallery. Welcome, climate change protestors.

Recently, an even scarier figure has appeared

Over the past six months, protestors have started to think more outside-the-box. The conventional stop-all-tra c and annoyevery-commuter protests have been proven colossal failures. Extinction Rebellion has realised that smashing windows and gluing themselves to the road is unproductive, so instead, they will “temporarily shift away from public disruption”. Their nonsense preaching going a little something like this: “artwork is protected better than the planet, so, artwork should be ruined to spread awareness. All hail the destruction of precious, culturally valuable art!” And collective chanting follows.

Dernière Rénovation (Last Renewal), a French activist group, got the ball rolling last October. In Paris, two young activists, Rachel and Arunau, doused Charles Ray’s Horse and Rider (2014) sculpture with orange paint. They then redressed the horse’s jockey in a white t-shirt reading “we have 858 days left”. An alarming figure, yes, but rather comical when worn by a motionless, steel statue.

The same month, more attacks followed. At Melbourne’s National Gallery of Victoria, Extinction Rebellion campaigners glued their hands to Picasso’s Massacre in Korea (1951). Shortly after, Just Stop Oil activists chucked Heinz tomato soup at Vincent van Gogh’s Sunflowers (1888) at London’s National Gallery. Then in November 2022, Letze Generation (Last Generation) sloshed black, oily liquid over Klimt’s Life and Death (1910), at the Leopold Museum in Vienna.

This list continues, but you get the point; famous artwork is being vandalised to voice the climate change crisis. 21-year-old Phoebe Plummer, who threw tomato soup over van Gogh’s £72.5m painting, explained “What is worth more? Art or life? Is it worth more than food? Worth more than justice? Are you more concerned about the protection of a painting or the protection of our planet and people?” They reason that art is respected more than the planet, so, art should be vandalised to make people realise such absurd, muddled priorities.

Phoebe does speak some half-truths. Art is an invaluable, priceless object that society protects like a new-born. Every art museum is dotted with beady-eyed security guards, paintings are protected by Perspex, and taking a flash photo is a heinous sin.

So, when we compare the treatment of art to the treatment of the planet, something seems o . The planet – a place that fosters our very existence – is not prioritised by the government that has the power to shift these priorities. Rather, the government subsidises the extraction of fossil fuels, the planet is warming at an alarming rate and, inevitably, we are amid the mass extinction of our own making. Although there are current pledges for action by 2030, even if delivered in full, this would mean a rise in global heating of around 2.5C.

So, action must be taken for you, and me, and future generations, but vandalising artwork is not the way to do it. Art and the climate crisis are completely unrelated. Art is a creative release; a blank canvas that gives artists the freedom to simply let go. The climate crisis is a global emergency; something that a ects everyone and so, only collective action will reduce its impact. Throwing Heinz tomato soup at art to spark collective action is simply irrational, especially in a society that respects the artistic realm more than anything.

Art and the climate crisis are completely unrelated

All in all, it simply paints climate change protestors as selfish individuals who go around trashing beautiful artwork for a release, not people trying to save the planet. These protestors will do anything to achieve their goal, and I do salute them for that. Ruining one of the most intimate, beautiful things humans have created is not the best approach. Stop taking climate change out on artwork. It does not achieve anything.

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