Art To Action

Thank goodness. We are becoming aware of all the plastic getting into the wrong places. It is in our seas, our oceans, in turtles, in birds, in us. It is everywhere.

There is a cycle: as people become galvanised to do something, that need is expressed in numerous, countless ways. Some turn to art: art created from plastic rubbish, to draw the attention of the people who still seem to be blissfully ignorant. The supermarkets that still package using plastic: the consumers who happily chuck it on the ground when they have finished with whatever the plastic had wrapped.

It has to be acknowledged that, in creating awareness of the problems of plastic, the most significant art of recent times has been created by the video camera and the operator behind the lens, who may be an individual or part of a larger, concerned, organisation. You will have seen terrible images of all species suffering at our hands, in places as far from ‘civilisation’ as you can imagine. The most memorable of these is in documentary form: Blue Planet. I was at a conference about the oceans a couple of weeks ago and Blue Planet was mentioned several times. Many people there had been galvanised into action by the images they saw.

If you class the medium of video as art, then video truly is turning art into action.

Looking ahead, how will this progress?

What the next concerns will be?

It will be interesting to see when we start panicking properly about the rest of the junk we tip in the oceans. Radioactive waste? Heavy metals? It is acknowledged that it is dangerous to eat many species of fish because of the high levels of toxic matter in their flesh.

Had you noticed that we tend to think of ourselves? If we eat the fish, it may not be good for us. How about the fish? Is it ok for them to suffer too, in these days of animal welfare. Just because we can’t see them doesn’t mean they don’t suffer. Will the medium of video teach us more about what we can’t see within the sea?

The unseen fish have sensors by which to be aware of their surroundings, just like birds. They swim in shoals, like birds fly in flocks.

I don’t believe it is acceptable to eat birds? I’ve not heard of folks eating blackbirds and starlings, except in nursery rhymes – though these songs were founded in fact. Many years ago, flocks of birds were caught in nets to be consumed. Would that be acceptable now? Perhaps in the future folks will reduce their consumption of fish when more is learnt about these unseen species, in the same way that many people now are vegetarians and – surprisingly to many, they function as well – in fact probably better – than those who eat meat.

Whatever your views, it will be interesting to see how the messages develop: what the messages will be and how they change. And how they will be conveyed. If a picture paints a thousand words, art, probably in the form of moving images, will inevitably be the way to convey that message to call us to action.