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“Trigger Points/Tipping Points”
at the Venice Biennale, the Boulder Museum and online
Contact: Aviva Rahmani at ghostnets@verizon.net
For further information on all events please
go to http://www.ghostnets.com/events2.html.
“Trigger Points/ Tipping Points,”
emerged from the virtual collaboration on global warming between
artist Aviva Rahmani, based on Vinalhaven
Island, Maine and in New York City and Boulder-based
scientist Dr. James White. This work was
created for “Weather Report,”
curated by Lucy Lippard for the Boulder
Museum of Contemporary Art (BMoCA), opening
September 14, Boulder, Colorado, with Marda Kirn
and EcoArts. The DVD documentation premieres with the international
network, cultura21 and will be followed by
a moderated discussion with Sacha Kagan, social scientist,
at the 52nd Venice Biennale,
at the Thetis New Arsenal, Venice, Italy,
4:10 PM, September 6, 2007, as part
of “The Cultural Dimension of Sustainability; Towards
an Ecology of Culture.”
“Trigger Points/ Tipping Points,” models
how virtuality can share resources and find solutions to global
warming. White and Rahmani began work in
February 2007 and dedicated five months to analyzing circumpolar
satellite imagery and research data. The edited dvd of their
working sessions, in the form of desktop sharing, using webcam,
pen tablet, photoshop and ordinary phones addressed how global
warming combines with increased population demands for fresh
water to change geopolitical relationships world wide. The
collaboration studied how global warming is creating hundreds
of millions of climate refugees and intensifying deadly conflict
zones across the earth, as peoples and other species compete
for ever scarcer resources. The three dramatic examples chosen
for study were in the trajectories of the Mississippi
in relation to New Orleans, the Nile in relation to Darfur
and the Ganges in relation to Bangladesh. The greatest
obstacle observed to adaptation to the massive changes required
to sustain life as we know it, is the accelerated time frame
of events. The project’s premise is that one answer to these
challenges is in virtual communication systems.
Dr. White, former Chair of the Environmental Studies
program at the University of Colorado in Boulder, Colorado
and Interim Director of INSTAAR (Institute of Arctic and Alpine
Research), Boulder, Colorado, is one of the top half-percentile
of most cited climate change scientists in his field of ice
core study. Ecological artist Aviva Rahmani’s
projects range from complete landscape restorations to museum
venues that reference painting, sound and photography. Rahmani
has taught, lectured and performed internationally, and is
the recipient of numerous grants and fellowships including
two from the Nancy H. Gray Foundation for Art in the
Environment in 1999 and 2000.
In addition to the installation for “Weather Report,”
Aviva Rahmani and Dr. Jim White will be presenting together,
with artist Andrea Polli, as part of a panel at the
Energy & Environmental Security Initiative
(EESI), 2:00 PM Monday, September 17th in Boulder.
September 11, Danish artist
Oleg Koefoed, member of The Flowers
of Sustainability and cultura21,
will participate from Italy, in a Virtual
Concert on talkshoe.com with Rahmani and
Lucy Lippard, podcasting from the Boulder
Museum of of Contemporary Art, to which Rahmani
traveled by train. Koefoed will report on
the cultura21 events at the Venice
Biennale and the circumpolar connections artists
are making to foster the kinds of changes human life must
confront today. To access this event live the day of the event,
go to talkshoe.com
to download the free software in advance.
The day of the event, go to http://www.talkshoe.com/talkshoe/web/talkCast.jsp?masterId=1210&cmd=tc
at 10:00 AM Eastern Standard Time and click
on talkshoelive. Alternately, the podcast may be downloaded
from the site, after the event.
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