A Reflection from the Prince Claus Fund & Goethe-Institut

 

Back in 2017, we started talking about how we, as art funders, could design a programme that more concretely addresses the myriad of intersecting issues caused by the climate crisis. In that time, the effects of our impact on the environment were becoming ever more evident, a fact that was finally seeping through into the popular imagination. Both our organisations had been supporting artists and initiatives working on this in a variety of ways, but we felt it was past time for us to hone in and solidify our commitment – in the hopes of creating space for possible new futures.

Both our organisations work from the conviction that art and culture are essential for creating open dialogue and for bridging the gap between theory, politics, and people. We believe that creating space for artists and cultural practitioners to expand their practices and engage in critical reflection on the climate crisis is an essential step in our understanding of how to respond with creativity and resilience to the future we are facing.  

It has been clear for years that while the main causers of the climate crisis are countries from the so-called global north, where both our organisations are based, the brunt of the impact is to be borne outside of these regions. This is an urgent but often ignored reality, and we believe that it is crucial to centre voices from the majority world in rethinking our collective response. If we actively listen to locally rooted perspectives, from people who are addressing the specific effects they are seeing and living first hand, in their own contexts and communities we can weave together a truer story of what the impact of the climate crisis really is.  

Initially the programme consisted of calls for project proposals, through which we supported 54 projects, from 37 countries, all looking in vastly different but compatible ways at a wide range of issues stemming from the climate crisis. Having the overview of all these projects, we could see many interconnections: between projects working on very different topics, in completely different contexts, where there was still much in common in approach, methodology, and experience. We began to see clearly that these connections could prove to be fertile ground, leading us to dream this mentorship into being.  

The most important element in setting up the programme was to create space for artists to jointly explore critical artistic practices and modes of environmental activism. We saw an opportunity to hold space for experimentation, for the development of narratives and practices, and for creating new and lasting connections. In its essence, this programme is complex and chaotic. With a group of 17 practitioners in total — all working on different thematics, using distinct modalities and forms, with diverse backgrounds, interests, and opinions- it does not easily lend itself to cohesion. On top of this, the programme adopts a process-based focus. This means there is no forced pressure on creating outputs, but also means that finding ways of anchoring the programme in the artists’ respective practices is a challenge.  

From the get-go, we embraced the errorist nature of this pilot year and decided to see where the programme would flow. Looking back, I would say this had its ups and downs. Our desire to keep the programme open and flexible led to it not always flowing unidirectionally, and occasionally even sputtering down into the tiniest of trickles. However, the willingness of the group to exchange and learn from each other remained the red thread, and as you will see in the conversations and exchanges sprinkled through this publication, this did create space for the building of relationships and common ground. It is the finding of connection and solidarity amongst people from different realities but with shared experiences and urgencies that was the collective’s greatest achievement.  

The programme’s strength is the plurality of narratives, voices, and ways of being and seeing it brings together. The space it holds for diverse practices and blurred disciplines speaks to the power of imagination, and each of these artists’ responses are an offering to a much wider and ongoing global conversation. As the programme continues to grow, expand, and evolve, we hope that the echoing of these responses will culminate into something much larger – something that can be a space of refuge, resilience, and resistance, not only for those who participate, but also for those who — through the publications and online space — enter into its dialogue. Ultimately it is this that we hope the programme will offer, a space for international solidarity and for imagining collective ways of addressing the many manifestations of the climate crisis.

This is a project that is made up of all the individuals participating in it, and I would like to thank everyone who did so for taking the dive with us, and for joining us in this wonderful experiment. 

 

°°°°°°°°°°°° Free the catfish / libera al bagre! °°°°°°°°°°°°

With conviction, on behalf of the Prince Claus Fund & Goethe-Institut,
Tessa Giller °
Head of Programmes, Prince Claus Fund °