Close Of Play: Climate Emergency and Creative Action
Collecting in a Climate Emergency
1pm, 5 November 2021 – book online via Eventbrite
What are the ways in which institutions have been collecting activism? And what are the issues around collecting works that address the climate emergency? This event is co-chaired by Judy Willcocks (Head of Museum & Study Collection at Central Saint Martins) and Susannah Waters (Archives and Collections Manager, The Glasgow School of Art).
In this 'Close Of Play: Climate Emergency and Creative Action’ event, in association with Climate Emergency Network (UAL), we hear from Caroline Gausden, curator at Glasgow Women’s Library on their Greenham Common archive and Samantha Jenkins, Collections Officer at People’s History Museum, Manchester on collecting protest.
Lucie Pardue and Judy Willcocks (UAL) share four key works from collecting contemporary art and design that addresses the climate emergency at UAL. They will discuss concerns including endangered materials, polluting processes, the carbon footprint of long-term preservation and ask the question should institutions be collecting at all?
Bridget McKenzie and Justine Boussard present Climate Museum UK’s project with MA Design History students at RCA on developing their collections ethos and processes. Part of this work has contributed to a chapter in the publication accompanying the ‘Reimagining Museums for Climate Action’ exhibition in Glasgow.
Susanna Cordner presents Contemporary Collecting Toolkit - an ethical toolkit that explores the resources and materials required to collect and preserve museum objects, the environmental cost of associated digital resources, how what we collect represents people as actors in climate change, collecting processes and intangible contributors to climate change and holding financial processes, economic practice and corporations to account.
A second related event, ‘Collecting the Climate Emergency: Process and Practice’ will take place on Earth Day, 2022. The Museums and Heritage Sector declares a climate emergency. However, there is no ready info available on what museums can do. How can this part of the sector challenge existing paradigms and make a radical response? This event is in association with Glasgow Women’s Library, UAL and GSA.
The Glasgow School of Art’s yearlong series of online public talks, 'Close Of Play: Climate Emergency and Creative Action’ explores the ways in which creative actions and multi-disciplinary practice can address climate emergency, sustainability, and climate justice. Each talk is hosted by a different part of GSA. This event is also part of 'Carnival of Crisis: Mobilising Creative Action in the Age of Emergency', hosted by the UAL Climate Emergency Network.
