DIY 9 Call for Proposals
Apr 18, 2012
Platform is collaborating with Live Art Development Agency (LADA) and others to participate in DIY 9 – professional development by artists for artists. DIY is an opportunity for artists working in Live Art to conceive and run unusual training and professional development projects for other artists. Deadline for proposals to run DIY 9 projects: Noon Monday...
Tate à Tate – new video
Apr 18, 2012
Check out the new promo video for Tate à Tate. And if you haven’t taken the tour yet, download for free at www.tateatate.org
UK DfID implicated in money-laundering investigation
Apr 16, 2012
Our friends at Corner House and Jubilee Debt Campaign have monitored how the UK government has given aid money to corrupt private equity firms in Nigeria. Below is the press release. It’s long, but well worth reading if you want understand how Western aid policy can undermine development. Campaigners slam Government’s development approach as DfID-backed...
Shell oil spills reach new peak; Nigeria hit hard
Apr 13, 2012
From Milieu Defensie (Friends of the Earth Netherlands): Amsterdam – Shell has released its 2011 Sustainability Report. The figures reveal that the number of leaks (208 worldwide) has risen for the first time since 2003: globally, Shell has leaked a total of 6.7 million litres of oil. That is the second highest peak this millennium....
Damien Hirst appropriated our work!
Apr 3, 2012
The new Damien Hirst retrospective which opens tomorrow 4th April at Tate Modern has forced a last minute revision of our BP themed alternative audio tour. The Hirst exhibition appropriated the floor space which contained Ai Weiwei’s Sunflower Seeds (see picture below) one of the featured artworks in our Tate à Tate audio tour. This...
Listening in with Tate à Tate
Mar 29, 2012
Dr Andrew Filmer, Lecturer in Drama, Theatre and Performance at Aberystwyth University reports back on his experience with the Tate à Tate audio tour. What I love about audio tours – such as Lavinia Greenlaw’s recent Audio Obscura, or Platform’s And While London Burns – is the way they help me sidestep the sensory overload...
Keeping on: sustainable art-activism
Mar 27, 2012
What enables artists and activists to keep on making work that challenges the status quo? How can we sustain ourselves, our imaginations, and our communities while keeping on speaking truth to power? On 14 March 2012, I wrote this to some people I have been working with recently: "I'm giving a presentation called "Keeping on: sustainable...
11,000 Nigerians sue Shell in London courts
Mar 23, 2012
From Leigh Day & Co: Six months after Shell admitted liability following two massive oil spills in the Niger Delta, law firm Leigh Day & Co are serving formal legal proceedings tomorrow (Friday 23 March 2012) on the oil giant in the High Court in London for compensation on behalf of over 11,000 Nigerians after...
Shell to pay $25m to Nigerian communities over oil spill
Mar 21, 2012
From UPI.com: Shell Petroleum Development Co. was ordered by a Nigerian court to pay more than $25 million to five communities in Imo state for a 1997 oil spill. The communities sued Shell for compensation for immediate direct losses to their means of livelihood caused by the oil spill, The Guardian in Oshodi, Nigeria, reported Tuesday....
Tate Soundscape Hijacked by Artists
Mar 20, 2012
BP’s environmental record is appalling yet many people are prepared to turn a blind eye to the fact that Tate is in bed with BP, one of the “ten worst corporations’’ based on its environmental and human rights record. A new series of artworks questioning Tate’s relationship with BP has been commissioned by three activist...
Social Licence: Complicity in the Age of Extraction
Mar 14, 2012
At first glance, there might not seem to be an obvious common ground between indigenous activists in Canada, performance artists in the UK and climate activists in both countries. However, the international controversy over Canada’s tar sands industry in northern Alberta has galvanised individuals from all these communities into new cooperative relationships opposing the developments....
IRIN news: Gas flares still a burning issue in the Niger Delta
Mar 12, 2012
The UN’s humanitarian news network, IRIN has reported on the ongoing health crisis caused by gas flaring in the Niger Delta. The burning off of gas that comes mixed with crude oil is harmful, illegal in Nigeria and has been found to violate human rights. Approximately $2.5 billion of gas is wasted each year, whilst less...
