Controversial Artist Justifies Bad Behaviour in the Arctic
by Leonora Oppenheim, London, UK 
on 12. 2.08
Why do we all keep leaving the lights on, driving our cars and hopping on airplanes when we know full well it's damaging the environment? There may be several answers to this question: necessity, convenience, selfishness? The connection between behavioural change and climate change is a complex issue that many people are trying to get to grips with.
One of them is artist Francesca Galeazzi who was part of the recent Cape Farewell expedition to the Arctic along with Graham Hill and beatboxer Schlomo. On the trip into the pristine wilderness Galeazzi tackled the problem of our conscious bad environmental behaviour head on with a controversial act of deliberate sabotage...
Releasing 6 kg of pure CO2
In one provocative move Galeazzi took a cyclinder containing 6kg of pure CO2, placed it in the most beautiful untouched place she could find and opened the valve. All the CO2 was directly released into the atmosphere in front of the Cape Farewell team and crew, all of whom had travelled to the Arctic in order to help in the fight against climate change.
Environmental Vandalism
Some described Galeazzi's performance piece as environmental vandalism, but then we could also levy this accusation at all the people who travelled to the arctic on the Cape Farewell expedition in the first place. Who together emitted a great deal more than 6kg of CO2, the equivalent of a 25 mile car journey, in their efforts to get there.
Offsetting Justifies Behaviour
The key part of Galeazzi's art work entitled 'Justifying Bad Behaviour' was the fact that the artist had offset her 6kg cylinder of CO2 before she even set out on the trip, therefore presumably justifying her bad behaviour. But of course it surely isn't that simple, as the controversy surrounding the viability of carbon offsetting schemes has proved.
What was the Point?
In an interview with the RSA magazine Francesca Galeazzi discusses her motivations for her art work:
I wanted to throw a comment on why society is so resistant to change. Instead of embracing change, we are inventing new mechanisms to greenwash our consciences, in a way. I didn’t want to say that carbon offsetting is bad because I believe it plays a role within our strategy to tackle climate change. But not as a starting point. It can come in when we’ve done all we can to reduce carbon emissions, all we can to think about the way we use resources, recycle, we produce waste. Only then we can begin to offset our carbon emissions… but not at the start. I’m not being preachy. I am no less guilty about this than anyone. I fly to my home in Italy sometimes. But we keep on doing the same things over and over. So there was also a kind of question there.
To read the full interview go to the RSA website.
Francesca Galeazzi
RSA Arts & Ecology
Cape Farewell
More on Cape Farewell:
Cape Farewell: A New Expedition Sets Sail
Making Stuff Cool, Making Stuff Uncool: Why Cultural Change is Key
The Masterful Beatboxing Shlomo: Music Without Instruments
Cape Farewell: Raising Climate Change Awareness Through Art
Follow @TreeHugger on Twitter & get our headlines with @TH_rss!
Thirsty for more? Check out these related articles:
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- Does Recycling Really Make a Difference?
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So?
The Co2 was ALREADY offset when she bought it. The Co2 that you can buy for soda/beer/paintball/etc is processed straight out of the atmosphere.
It's not some magical "new" source of Co2. It's already there in our atmosphere. She basically just moved it to a different area.
Enh. Whatever. First off, as chs says, the carbon dioxide came direct from the atmosphere anyway.
Second, CO2 isn't that bad of a thing to release into the arctic, especially in such small amounts. It's the gigatonnes that we produce, not the kilograms, that matter.
Third, it's neither a shocking event, nor a particularly thought-provoking one. If Francesca wanted to make an outrageous statement that would shock and apall people (preferrably the people that need to change, but then...), she would kick over a barrel of crude onto the tundra and give her reason as either "for art", or something astonishingly silly like "I wanted the price of gas to go down by a penny". The latter reason would be a statement on how society is willing to go out of its way to destroy all that is pure for astonishingly stupid and selfish reasons. It would also equate drilling in ANWR, which would spill far, far more oil onto the tundra, for roughly the same result.
Similar shock value could be had by taking a Reindeer into downtown Chicago and telling passers-by that as an art project, you will feed it 1 gallon of crude oil in an effort to lower the price of gas, and that the animal will likely die as a result.
I pick up a piece of litter then drop it on the ground again. Is this littering?
Releasing CO2 that would be released anyway is even less interesting.
"...offset her 6kg cylinder of CO2 before she even set out on the trip, therefore presumably justifying her bad behaviour." Couldn't have said it better. That's all an offset does: justifies bad behavior.
I understand the artists viewpoint but, you know, it what it is and it lacked a bit of self-criticism IN the act itself even though not in her explanation...
She could have contained the self criticism in her act but without it just shouts out "#$%& nature" and I can hear oil lobbyists high-fivin' each other over this.
Whew! Now I don't feel so guilty about releasing that canister of Zyklon B, this morning.
Artists: our intellectual and moral superiors.
So does this mean that if I donate money to a pro-peace organization I can go and punch somebody in the face? After all, my violence has been offset.
a ton is a ton. offsets are not perfect but the mobilize cash flow for carbon reduction projections. the CDM under KYOTO has registered 3000 offset projects, inspiring thousands of low carbon entrepreneurs in developing nations to think about how to reduce carbon.
naysers of offsets make some valid points. strengthen regulations, create uniform policy, and greater transparency. no doubt. but the "pay to pollute" arguments are growing tired.
this woman, failing to offer solutions e.g. how to improve Cap & Trade mechanisms, or Kyoto's CDM, is reminiscent of ann coulter's witch hunts, particularly, against republicans, because infighting sells.