By Emily Beater
WALLPAPER which measures pollution, children’s activities and a pirouetting ballerina are among the unusual attractions at an art exhibition to raise awareness of climate change.
The Future Knowledge show at Modern Art Oxford, in Pembroke Street, explores the impact we have on our environment.
It features wallpaper that changes colour in response to air pollutants, an installation made of fungus as a sustainable replacement for building materials, and a performance by Estonian dancer and choreographer Eve Mutso, who will kick off the exhibition by dancing en-pointe in graphite powder while being suspended from the gallery ceiling – the marks from her shoes showing the physical impact a person can have on the world in a short period of time.
Stephanie Straine, curator of exhibitions at the gallery, said: “The exhibition looks at how designers can come up with artistic solutions to environmental issues in 2018, rather than seeing things like climate change as a disastrous inevitability.
“The artists have all worked closely with science, and we want to show how art can collaborate with science to help solve climate change.”
All the works featured in Future Knowledge will explore how we relate to our environment and will encourage the viewer to reflect on climate change and mankind’s involvement in it.
Artist Lucy Kimbell chose wallpaper as her medium, showing it isn’t for covering-up but for exposing serious environmental concerns.
Her prototype for a wallpaper that changes colour in response to particle in the air reveals, in a highly visual way, just what it is we’re breathing in.
Tania Kovats’ striking sculptures of salt and distressed steel, on the other hand, will demonstrate the oneness of our environment and the idea that the world has one, collective ocean.
The final part of the exhibition invites visitor participation and will introduce viewers to exciting new solutions for environmental change. Exploration Architecture will demonstrate materials and systems that are based on nature itself, to show how the most sustainable solutions to our problems lie in the natural world.
Ms Straine added: “We want to appeal to both our local audience and tourists visiting the city. The hope is that people who aren’t automatically interested in contemporary art will come in, see the exhibition, and start to make more sustainable changes.
“Perhaps someone with a scientific background might also see how art and science can work together to solve environmental issues. Art and science are not separate entities.”
p Future Knowledge takes place at Modern Art Oxford, Pembroke Street, Oxford, from this Friday until October 28. Entry is free. More details from modernartoxford.org.uk
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