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Friday 4 December
Ackroyd & Harvey, Beuys' Acorns, 2007 onwards. Mixed media, Courtesy of the artists
Details of events running throughout the evening:
6.30pm Introduction to the exhibition by co-curators David Buckland and Kathleen Soriano at the top of the main stairs, in front of Mona Hatoum's Hot Spot.
6.45pm, Gallery 7B, Ackroyd & Harvey, Beuys’ Acorns, 2007 onward
A forum with artists Heather Ackroyd & Dan Harvey speaking about their work Beuys’ Acorns with Dr Roland Ennos, Life Sciences, Manchester University, speaking on the role of trees in the water cycle and his research on how increasing green cover in urban areas can mitigate against future temperature rises.
7.15pm, Gallery 10, Antti Laitinen, It’s My Island l-lV, 2007
A forum with artist Antti Laitinen speaking about his piece It's My Island with Robert Barker and Richard Coutts of Baca Architects discussing the challenges and solutions of architecture and engineering to house a rising global population, constructing on areas previously not built on and designing buildings to cope with rising water levels. David Buckland moderates the ensuing discussions.
7.45pm, Gallery 9, Tue Greenfort, Medusa Swarm, 2009
A forum with exhibition curator Kathleen Soriano or Edith Devaney discussing Medusa Swarm by Tue Greenfort, and Professor Callum Roberts, World Wildlife Fund ambassador, oceanographer and marine scientist, York University, discussing rising sea temperatures and acidification of oceans and the impact on living organisms.
8.15pm, Gallery 8, Mariele Neudecker, 400 Thousand Generations, 2009
A forum with artist Mariele Neudecker speaking about her work 400 Thousand Generations with Dr João Rodrigues of the Polar Oceans Physics Group, Cambridge University, discussing changes in the polar sea ice cover and the impact on the ecosystem, and Mariele’s interest in exploring perception.
9pm, Gallery 8
To conclude the evening, Professor Diana Liverman, Director, Environmental Change Institute, Oxford University, brings together various water-related climate issues and comments on the role of the arts in addressing environmental issues and climate change, shifting perception, raising awareness, provoking thought and action.
Throughout the evening, One-minute climate-change statements
Guest speakers and members of the public speak to camera for one minute about urgent environmental issues that concern them, their vision of the future, how to change the world, imaginative solutions to environmental issues, and their response to the artworks and exhibition. Darren Almond’s artwork Tide - a wall of analogue clocks which flip and sound every minute - provides the backdrop and stopwatch. A selection of these one-minute video clips will be screened on the RA website.
Friday 22 January
6.30–10pm
Mona Hatoum, 'Hot Spot', 2006. Stainless steel and neon tube, 220 x 220 cm. David Roberts Collection, London. Photo Stephen White, courtesy White Cube
In the second of these lively themed evenings, artists, scientists, and you the audience explore issues raised by works of art in the exhibition and examine the artists’ responses to climate change. Also, record your own one-minute climate-change statements.
Confirmed speakers include: Professor Chris Rapley, Director, The Science Museum; George McCain, Honorary Research Associate, Oxford university Museum of Natural History and the Department of Zoology, Oxford University; Richard Pike, CEO, Royal Society of Chemists; Professor David MacKay, Chief Scientific Advisor to the Department of Energy and Climate Change; Ackroyd & Harvey, artists; Edward Burtynsky, artist.
These talks focus on the human interdependence with the natural world through the presence of trees.
Friday 11 December
Ackroyd & Harvey talk with Jim Smith of the Trees and Design Action Group of the Forestry Commission and Steven Johnson of The Architecture Ensemble.
Gallery 7B; 6.30–7.30pm
8 January
Architect Michael Pawlyn joins Ackroyd & Harvey. Pawlyn established 'Exploration' in 2007 to focus exclusively on environmentally sustainable projects that take their inspiration from nature. Prior to setting up the company, he worked with Sir Nicholas Grimshaw PRA for ten years and was central to the team that radically re-invented horticultural architecture for the Eden Project.
15 January
Activist and barrister Polly Higgins joins Ackroyd & Harvey. Higgins has created a Declaration of Planetary Rights calling on the UN to address climate change now as it addressed human rights sixty years ago. The website 'Trees Have Rights Too' documents the progress of her campaign.
Sunday 17 January
Families explore issues related to climate change and art, react to the ways in which artists address the environment and ecology, and create art that expresses their own ideas about our future on this planet, through a variety of hands-on workshops, storytelling and interactive talks.
10.30am–5.30pm
Friday 15 January
Kim Jacobson presents this tour with BSL interpretation from Roger Beeson and lipspeaking support from Vicky Waite.
6–7pm; £3 (includes exhibition entry), please book tickets through the Access Officer
