I recently turned down an opportunity organised by a well thinking public organisation to make and exhibit some artwork. The underlying principle of the proposed show was to ‘increase public awareness’ of climate change. My refusal was polite, and their intentions were, as I said, well meant; however, I also considered their arrival to the party at best, fashionably late and at worst, a waste of time. I did have other work I was prioritising, so my refusal wasn’t entirely selfless, but I do think that the public are now very aware of the reality of climate change. Those that vociferously attack the green wedge and cling on to the idea that the extremes of weather we know see across the globe are no worse or more frequent than those in the historical record are probably attempting to convince themselves that they do not have to change the perfumed lifestyles that they’ve grown accustomed to as safe until the day they’re dust or compost.
Inside the often insular working world I’ve chosen to rattle around in, the ‘art world’, we also should be looking at how we can minimise our impact on the environment. We need, and this includes at an institutional level, to address the processes of making, selling and exhibiting art in a manner that minimises that impact.
Like every other aspect of human activity, resources are consumed in the production of art objects. That consumption can be investigated by the individual artist to find the least impactful route in the delivering of a preferred outcome; it will generally be different for all. Personally, I’ve chosen a return to drawing on old newspapers and card packaging for preparatory and sketching work and save the best art papers for finished pieces and I will make more oil paintings on heavy paper and canvas boards rather than stretched canvases.
I have also looked at a more responsible approach to framing for my work. Previously I worked with framers who only used responsibly sourced wood but that is now becoming prohibitively expensive to self-fund without an exhibition in place. So, after some lengthy self-research, I have now decided to frame drawings using IKEA frames. This is a company that claims to work with an underpinning of environmental responsibility, and though I can only research as deeply as normally possible for a consumer, I think their claims are genuine. I now try to restrict the dimensions of most of my work to their framing dimensions. This has the bonus, IKEA being a global brand, of letting me ship work unframed to be mounted in the destination country via the stock from their local IKEA – reducing transport costs and carbon footprint (this was something I first did with my ‘Purgatorio’ exhibition in 2010 with Brooklynite Gallery in the U.S.)
A couple of the galleries I’ve worked with were not always supportive of this because of some pushback from potential buyers – but the work can always be reframed at their location if they are insistent. And, during my googly research, it was also interesting to find out that the recycled acrylic used in the IKEA frames was less energy and resource intensive in its production than traditional picture glass. Perhaps a bit counterintuitive for an old punk-hippy like me who’d always assumed glass was essentially the ‘go to’ recyclable.
Another change in habits is the personal cessation of turning up for opening evenings all around the planet. I haven’t flown now for eight years and yes, I do consider it a loss. I did enjoy visiting foreign cities that were only accessible via overseas flights, but it was never essential that I was there. It’s something that we could all consider regarding its necessity. This has also cost me the odd exhibition as I wouldn’t be able to also paint an exterior mural to promote a gallery’s show. I tried to accommodate by offering to send large drawn work to be pasted to the walls (my actual origins under the notion of street art) … but to no avail – they want their painted murals (keeping up with the Gallery Jones perhaps).
So the point I’m so laboriously dragging my arse around to… the current exhibition in Pasadena, California. The title of the show is ‘Works on Paper’. It’s not an original title for an exhibition, but it is a very specific title to the reason as to what work is there and why it’s there. Obviously, there are drawings and pastels but there are also oil paintings and mixed media works… all on paper. All the work is unframed for the two reasons of minimising the overall carbon footprint of transport and wanting to highlight the aspect of the unexceptional aspect of work being presented unframed in a gallery. So, my thanks go out to the very sympathetically minded Li Mei – Franco Gallery and the co-curators Xristine Franco and Michael Goldbrandsen who made it possible with all enthusiasm and sympathetically supportive outlooks.

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