Artist Brigade

 

Bringing arts and artists to the front lines of climate action

Artist Brigade is a leaderless, national movement. Our goal is to bring imagination, vision and the heart of artists into the telling of the climate story in order to mobilize a society paralyzed by climate anxiety and grief. We work in cross-sector partnerships with those currently telling the climate narrative, environmental organizations, activists, scientists, journalists, and scholars. 

 

BIG YES!

If you want to join the Artist Brigade, click here and send us an email with the subject line ‘Big Yes!’

Artist Brigade 100

We are pleased to welcome the first official cohort of the Artist Brigade: bringing arts and artists to the front lines of climate action. These artists were selected from a large pool of applicants to spend the year with us, meeting and learning, going on field trips, partnering with others telling the climate story, and, as David Maggs says, ‘reauthoring the world’.

 

Basic Training

Our year started with Greenhouse, a two-day paid intensive for 100 artists. Greenhouse took place outdoors in the sunshine at UBC Botanical Gardens with the goals of climate literacy and new perspectives on the role of the artist in the climate crisis, connecting both with our ancestors and a hopeful future.

Field Work

After the artists complete Greenhouse, they have the opportunity to go on one of 4 ‘field trips’ to places where they can see the climate in crisis. Then, artists have the chance to pitch artistic projects that address the crisis. Some of the pitches will be commissioned. All of this work is paid.

Front Line Action

We work with the others in society that are telling the climate story: environmental organizations, scientists, activists, journalists, and government. By partnering on tough questions, we can bring forth big ideas, that vivify and mobilize society at this critical time. 

Toolkits

We are working on creating toolkits and resources for your own work with the Artist Brigade. So be sure to check back to this space for updates. For now, here are a few links that you may find helpful:

  1. Click here to contribute to the Idea Library, a place to contribute or take ideas for climate art work, a free-for-all living library of open-source ideas.
  2. If you want to do a climate acknowledgment for an event, you might look at this video for a recent example of the climate acknowledgement that we did for Greenhouse.
  3.  SCALE (Sectoral Climate Arts Leadership for the Emergency) is the national Canadian working group for climate art changemaking. To get involved with SCALE, please email info@scale-lesaut.ca.

The Work