Arts of Coming Down to Earth：Conference and Workshop

Declaring climate emergency is not an option.

 Climate action requires artists and the cultural sector to bring the issue forward for wider understanding. Arts of Coming Down to Earth, initiated by Stéphane Verlet-Bottéro seeks to engage artistic institutions through three steps: (1) Evaluate the environmental footprint of Taipei Biennial 2020; (2) Regeneration actions; (3) Symposium and workshop.
Facilitated by Bamboo Curtain Studio, the third movement aims to raise sustainability awareness and commitments among visual art organizations and networks in Taiwan, by supporting institutions and individuals to evaluate their carbon footprint, transform their practices and restore local environments through artistic, activist and educational work.

On the first day, the Symposium will introduce environmental commitments within arts organizations and how to adopt an environmental policy, with the help of case studies. It proposes to rethink and redesign cultural institutions into models of radical sustainability that inspire experimentation and mutation across society and productive fields at large. The Workshop on the second day, moderated by professionals in visual arts, and practitioners of eco-action, invites culture workers and activists to witness the challenges at stake, bring to awareness the sector's environmental footprint, then suggest methods for emission reduction, community-based carbon capture and ecosystem restoration.

Intended as a platform for intra-institutional activism, the event will result in a collectively written and signed Manifesto towards environmental commitments and pathways for action.

The reader Arts of Coming Down to Earth edited by Stéphane Verlet-Bottéro, brings together active voices in the field, speaks from various contexts and with diverse perspectives to rethink and redesign systems of art production, as well as address environmental externalities in the visual art industry.