the speakers
the speakers
Get to know the speakers line-up for June 21, 2020 and don't forget to tune in when we go live!
Niels de Saint Gillens
Niels, the Grand Duchy of the ecological micronation of Flandrensis, started his journey in September 2008 when he first created Flandrensis and joined the micronational community at the end of that year. He became notorious in the community because of the diplomatic dispute with the micronation of Westarctica; due to this dispute Niels created a reputation for himself as a micronational pacifist and in 2009 he received the Schneider Award, the very first peace award granted by the micronational community. Today, Niels is a well-known figure in the micronational community, especially for his influence in ecological micronationalism which he himself coined and introduced to the community. He spends his time dealing with Flandrensian affairs and advocating for climate change, while delivering speeches on “Hobby-micronationalism in the 21st century” and “The influence of the internet on micronationalism”.
The Importance of Ecological Micronations
- Opening Words
Date: 06.21.20
Time: 11:56-12:03
Niels de
Saint Gilleans
Saint Gilleans
Olafur
Eliasson
Eliasson
Olafur
Eliasson
Eliasson
James Balog
11:56 - 12:03 //
niels de saint gillens
Niels, the Grand Duchy of the ecological micronation of Flandrensis, started his journey in September 2008 when he first created Flandrensis. He became notorious in the community because of the diplomatic dispute with the micronation of Westarctica; due to this dispute Niels created a reputation for himself as a micronational pacifist and in 2009 he received the Schneider Award, the very first peace award granted by the micronational community. Today, Niels is a well-known figure especially for his influence in ecological micronationalism which he himself coined and introduced to the community. He spends his time dealing with Flandrensian affairs and advocating for climate change, while delivering speeches on “Hobby-micronationalism in the 21st century” and “The influence of the internet on micronationalism”.
12:10- 12:17 //
olafur eliasson
Olafur Eliasson is a Dutch-Icelandic artist known for large-scale installation art employing elemental materials such as light, water, and air temperature to enhance the viewer’s experience. One of his latest sculpture projects, "Ice Watch," involves a dozen icy chunks arranged to resemble an ominous clock; though the ice pieces look as though they’ve been surreptitiously washed ashore in the middle of a city, the melting artifacts represent the amount of ice that disappears every 100th of a second due to conditions of global warming. As they crack, break and disappear, members of the public are able to witness firsthand the death of Arctic ice. “As an artist, I am interested in how we give knowledge a body. What does a thought feel like, and how can felt knowledge encourage action?” Olafur explains. “ We are all part of the ‘global we’; we must all work together to ensure a stable climate for future generations.”
12:25 - 12:32 //
james balog
James Balog is an American photographer whose work explores the relationship between humans and nature. Since the early 1980s, Balog has photographed subjects such as endangered animals, North America's old-growth forests, and polar ice. His work aims to combine insights from art and science in order to produce innovative, dynamic and sometimes shocking interpretations of our changing world. His project, "The Extreme Ice Survey" or "EIS", depicts the story of a changing planet, where he shares new image sequences from a network of time-lapse cameras that shoot year-round, every half-hour of daylight, recording glaciers receding at an alarming rate - some of the most vivid evidence yet of climate change. Now in its second decade of field operations, EIS is the world's most extensive ground-based photographic glacier study to date.
12:40 - 12:47 //
dr. matt winning
Dr Matt Winning is a London-based Scottish comedian and environmental economist who combined his two professions together to become an environmental comedian; he hosts the podcast "Operation Earth," a comedy podcast about climate change where each week a new guest is interviewed by Matt about topical climate news stories, walking through their carbon footprint and answering burning questions. Matt also performs live climate change comedy; his comedy shows include, "Filibuster", "Climate Strange", and "It's the End of the World As We Know It." As a comedian, he uses comedy and laughter as a way to talk about global warming and climate change, topics people tend to avoid talking about, and thus shows how humor can bring people together and cause change.
12:55 - 13:02 //
alejandro duran
Alejandro Durán uses art to spotlight the ongoing destruction of our oceans' ecosystems. His colorful and breathtaking pieces show how he meticulously organizes and reuses plastic waste washed up and gathered from around the world - everything from water bottles to prosthetic legs - to create vivid, environmental artworks that may leave you mesmerized and shocked. In his long-term project, "Washed Up: Transforming a Trashed Landscape", Alejandro collects international trash washed up on the Caribbean coast of Mexico and transforms it into aesthetic yet disquieting art works. Using photography and installation, he examines the fraught intersections of man and nature, revealing the pervasive impact of consumer culture on the natural world, waking us up to the threat of plastic pollution in the hopes to incite change in our actions.
13:10 - 13:17 //
in-q (adam schmalholz)
IN-Q, short for "In Question", is the stage name of Adam Schmalholz, a spoken word artist, a National Poetry Slam Champion, a multi-platinum songwriter, and a world-renowned keynote speaker. Ultimately, IN-Q writes to entertain, inspire, and challenge his audiences to look deeper into the human experience and ask questions about themselves, their environment, and the world at large. In his spoken word piece, "A Poet's Plea to Save Our Planet", IN-Q poetically and verbally captures the urgency of climate change; he urges us to take ownership of the Earth and the damage that we’ve committed, and ends with a call to action: “One little dot is all that we’ve got... we just forgot that none of it’s ours; we just forgot that all of it’s ours.”
13:25 - 13:32 //
simon norfolk
Simon Norfolk is a part of an artist collaboration called Project Pressure, a charity with a mission to visualize climate crisis. Unlike wildfires and flooding, glaciers are not part of the weather system and when looking at glacier mass loss over time, one can see the result of global heating. This makes glaciers key indicators of the climate crisis and the focus of their work. Their projects were developed and executed with scientists to ensure accuracy. Their project, "Meltdown: Visualizing Climate Change," focuses on the fate of the world’s glaciers through the prism of art, photography and film. One of the artists involved, Simon Norfolk, describes the underlying method of approach to the project is to “us[e] art as a kind of seduction to draw people in, then shock them.” In 2015, Simon Norfolk's contributions to Project Pressure won the Sony World Photography Award in the landscape category.
13:40 - 13:47 //
tamiko thiel
Tamiko Thiel is an American artist best known for her digital art, where she explores the interplay of play, space, the body, and cultural identity, utilizing augmented reality as her medium and platform of choice. In her exhibit, "Unexpected Growth", displayed at the Whitney Museum of American Art in 2018, she shows how "perturbations in the natural order have torn the fabric of the space-time continuum, and unexpected growths are seeping into our world - perhaps from our own future. Augmented reality apps transform our phones into "ARscopes," where the "virtual growth," made up from an odd mixture of coral animals and plastic, seems to physically respond to the human gaze, absorbing electromagnetic energy from our "ARscopes." Over the course of a day and depending on the number of people viewing it, the accumulated exposure causes the growth to bleach or fade-out.
13:55 - 14:02 //
baltimore improv group
Baltimore Improv Group, "BIG" for short, is an improv comedy group located in Maryland, USA. One of their most popular improv sketches, already in its second year, called "Improv Will Save Our Planet", is a comedy and interview show produced by members of Maryland’s environmentalist community. “Improv Will Save Our Planet“ performers start off by interviewing local environmental leaders, then performing and creating on-the-spot comedy scenes and inventing characters to amplify their important messages that they want to relay to the audience. Through the use of humor, wit, and feeding off the energy of the crowd, BIG is able to discuss "heavy-like" topics, such as climate change, by changing them to feel more "light" and open, achieving a successful and easier way to invite action and a will for change.
14:10 - 14:17 //
tribhangi dance group
The Tribhangi Dance Group is a South African dance group who uses the art of dance to create awareness on what they see as today's greatest challenge: climate change. In their new piece titled, "The Climate Change Dance," a classical-contemporary Indian dance, the dancers/ artists use motion and music to portray a strong environmental message to the audience and to the world. The main part of the dance titled, "Panja Butaa," translates from Hindu to mean the 5 elements of the world, which also relates to the 5 senses. The show's creator and artistic director, Jayesperi Moopen, describes how the idea of the dance piece came to life when she asked herself, "what can I do as an artist, by making something not too heavy but making it understandable through dance and movement, where the audience not only appreciates what you're doing but the message is not lost."
