Embroidered
dinosaurs decorate the history of fossil fuels on Sandra M. Sawatzky’s
“Black Gold Tapestry,” part of an exhibition on human environmental
impacts at the MassArt Art Museum. As the city looks to reduce carbon
emissions, art like the MassArt exhibit provides one way of
communicating about the crisis.
An image of David Ortiz illustrates the effects of climate change in Silvia López Chavez’s mural at Fenway Park.
Installations explore human impacts on the environment
At a little museum on Huntington Avenue, 200 feet of linen, lined with colorful images of dinosaurs, depicts the history of fossil fuels from the Triassic Period to the late-1900s when researchers showed carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere were steadily rising.
The last six feet of the artwork, without words, shows the impact of oil spills and other pollution on people, wildlife and the environment.
This “Black Gold Tapestry,” a hand-embroidered artwork by artist Sandra M. Sawatzky, is part of “Displacement,” a new exhibit at the MassArt Art Museum that opened at the end of June, exploring how humans have affected the environment and how the environment is responding.
As organizations across the city work to meet climate goals that would sharply limit their emissions in the coming decades, exhibitions like “Displacement” have a role to play in communicating about climate change and the impacts it can pose, said Amy Longsworth, executive director of the Boston Green Ribbon Commission.
“Art
can stimulate discussion. It can poke and provoke and ask questions and
scare you and delight you. It gets to your emotions in a way that a
report can’t,” Longsworth said.
That
ability of art isn’t unique to discussing climate change, though
conversations around climate and environment are one important outlet,
said Annie Lundsten, a cofounder of the Experience Alchemists, an
experience design and consulting firm.
“Art
always has played a role in helping us, as humans, think differently
about the world around us,” she said. “Whether it’s climate change or
the political landscape or how we interact with each other.”
It’s
a role that comes from art’s ability to evoke emotion in a way that
simple data or words can’t always do, said Silvia López Chavez, a local
mural artist whose work has included images focused on climate and
rising sea levels.
“I
think art has the ability to bring it home, to bring some clarity around
certain topics in a way that is understood by many audiences,” López
Chavez said.
“I think that in particular, it’s being able to dissect or focus on a specific area in small bites so people can understand it.”
Sometimes
that work involves translating data into a more immediately
recognizable form. A 2022 project she did at Fenway Park, featuring an
image of former Red Sox player David “Big Papi” Ortiz, showed the two
feet that sea levels are expected to rise in the area by the year 2070.
That
mural was one of six temporary public art installations across the city
aiming to draw attention to the climate and environment as part of the
Action Pact campaign, an effort organized by the Green Ribbon Commission
— with support from Lundsten’s Experience Alchemists — in partnership
with institutions like the Museum of Fine Arts, the Museum of Science
and the Red Sox.
But, for López Chavez, more important than visualizing data is telling a story.
“My
hope is that that the more time you spend with the imagery, the more
you understand what’s happening, and the more you learn about what the
message is,” she said.
For
example, another mural by López Chavez in East Boston, called “Rise,”
shows a mostly-submerged female figure surrounded by natural elements,
like seaweed and a North Atlantic right whale, as well as human-caused
impacts in oceans, like netting and floating plastic.
“She’s
overwhelmed by water, but at the same time she’s calm, and it looks
like she’s using her hands in action, she’s doing something about what
happened. … You start questioning, ‘Why is she doing that?’” López
Chavez said of that work, which was part of the international Sea Walls
art program.
Other cultural institutions in the city have taken a stab at the work as well.
The
New England Aquarium, through both its public-facing outreach and its
research, focuses efforts on conservation and climate change. In
November, the aquarium displayed a public art photo series highlighting
locations along the city’s waterfront and encouraging connection and
engagement with those spaces to support resilience efforts.
Similarly, other organizations like the Arnold Arboretum or the Zoo New England pay similar attention to conservation efforts.
But
in other institutional settings, where environmental messaging isn’t
necessarily expected to be baked into the mission, it’s a process that
can be slow to develop.
When
she first joined the Green Ribbon Commission in 2016, Longsworth said,
she had lofty goals of jumping into the fray and convincing museums and
cultural institutions to make immediate changes.
“I
was like, ‘I know — I’ll just tell them we exist, and then they’ll do
exhibits about climate change. It’s so simple,’ and that was hopelessly
naïve,” she said. “I mean, these are world-class organizations. They
take five or 10 years to plan an exhibit. They borrow from all over.
They do not listen to people like me telling them they should do things
about climate change.”
But
Longsworth said the Commission began to do work in helping to develop
educational programs focusing on climate change at cultural
institutions, an area where she said there’s been more progress.
When
institutions do develop exhibitions about climate and environment, it’s
also a process of exploring what art and what exhibitions about the
topic mean.
Lundsten,
who has a background working with museums and other institutions, said
it’s easier for contemporary art that can address the topic more
directly and that sometimes exhibits ostensibly about climate might just
focus on nature.
“If
you’re talking about plants and animals, that’s awesome and lovely, and
it’s great to draw people’s attention to the natural world, but it
doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re opening discourse or getting the
topic of climate change to the top of the top of the pile,” she said.
Meanwhile,
as cultural organizations in Boston explore how to communicate about
climate change in their unique ways, the same organizations face pending
deadlines to reduce their own emissions.
Under
2021 regulations passed by the Boston City Council called the Building
Emissions Reduction and Disclosure Ordinance — or BERDO — all buildings
greater than 20,000 square feet must decrease their emissions in
five-year increments to reach net-zero targets by 2050.
The
regulatory push is leading local institutions to reexamine their
environmental impact. López Chavez pointed to efforts at Fenway Park
around plastic waste the ballpark has engaged in in addition to
communication efforts like her mural.
According
to reporting from the Boston Globe, other institutions like the
Isabella Stewart Gardener Museum are looking to implement cleaner energy
sources and more energy-efficient appliances like LED lightbulbs, while
others like the New England Aquarium are cleaning and recycling
resources like water in exhibits to minimize use.
That
work comes as part of climate action plans developed with assistance by
the Green Ribbon Commission. Longsworth said the effort started with
cultural institutions, but the commission is expanding to other
companies and organizations, as groups across the board have to adjust
to BERDO requirements.
“We
cut our teeth on the cultural institutions, we welcome cultural
institutions, but honestly now, with BERDO in place, every single
institution in Boston needs a climate action plan,” she said. “We take
all comers.”