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Strength in collective action – The Oil Machine in Dumfries
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May 1, 2023
A sudden burst of clapping from a couple at the back of the café and a ripple of laughter through the audience. This is the first response of the evening and the humour is ironic. It is in response to comments from the panel about the challenge of getting to Dumfries by train. Later the...
Cromarty – Gifts from the Sea
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Feb 7, 2023
The Stagecoach bus judders and swerves as it takes the bend past Braehead and Davidston, past the fields of stubble and grazing sheep. The driver knows these empty roads on The Black Isle intimately and is eager to reach the journey’s end. Suddenly, over the crest of the hill, Cromarty Firth appears in the sharp...
The Cardinal’s Song – In honour of Suzi Gablik and her bright bold inspiring words
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May 26, 2022
Amongst the White Oaks and Hickory trees at the headwaters of the New River, the Cardinals are singing. Their brilliant red wings flashing amongst the silver branches and trunks. Spring time in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Appalachia. Suzi Gablik is leaving her body behind. As breath moves slowly in and out of her lungs,...
Tectonic shifts – the energy crisis and the leap beyond – The Economic War, part 4
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Apr 4, 2022
Shell declares it may go back into Cambo and the oilfield’s exploration license is extended by two years. The British government pushes for renewed drilling in the UK North Sea. There is public outcry at the Chancellor’s failure to defend households from the attack on living standards driven by price inflation. The Russian government announces...
The Guns of Economic War – unpicking the decisions by BP to sell out of Russia
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Mar 4, 2022
Far from the terrifying realities of the shelling of civilians in Kyiv, Kharkiv and other Ukrainian cities, far from the desperation of women and children trying to board trains for Poland, far from the sickening din of armour in the streets, the guns the economic war are firing. The bravery of Ukrainian citizens in resisting...
Ukraine & the grip of gas – caught in the machine of Crude Britannia
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Feb 1, 2022
The newsfeeds hiss and rumble with stories of a possible Russian invasion of Ukraine. We are all of us left waiting. Is this truly going to happen, a military conflict between Russia and NATO? Or is this a fevered concoction that aids the Kremlin, the US Administration, and the UK’s flailing Prime Minister? Will the...
From Oil Road to Fire Road – of oil pipelines, gas pipelines and climate chaos
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Nov 26, 2021
Authored by James Marriott of Platform drawing on the collective experience of so many others in Platform and the multiple organisations we’ve collaborated with. Prompted by an invitation from the Climate Cultures Festival in Berlin to speak about Crude Britannia and The Oil Road, co-authored with Mika Minio-Paluello, I returned to the Baku-Tiblisi-Ceyhan Oil Pipeline...
Of Plastics and Brexit – the struggle against the new lords of oil & gas
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Apr 4, 2019
On 16th January 2019 news was leaked through the German paper Handelsblatt of The Alliance to End Plastic Waste. A new industrial coalition that will invest $1billion over the next five years in a campaign to reduce the amount of plastic waste in the world. Here was a powerful body of major corporations determining to...
Victory at Leith Hill! Divest Fracking! Resisting sites of speculation
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Oct 12, 2018
This piece was written before the news of the draconian jail sentences passed on those opposing fracking in Preston, Lancashire … but that bitter ruling does not destroy the reality that shortly before that decision we celebrated a Victory! The News of an Amazing Victory! We wrote of it as follows … The permission to...
The Invisible Machine – a gas pipeline in the Caucasus and a handshake in No10
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May 1, 2018
On the evening of Thursday 26th April 2018, it was warm and sunny in London. President Ilham Aliyev strode down Downing Street and was met by Prime Minister Theresa May with smile and a handshake. They posed for the cameras on the red carpet outside No 10 and then retired inside. A short formal chat...
The River Resurfaces – reflecting on politically engaged art from the 1970s to today
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Sep 12, 2017
I’m sitting talking with Caroline Tisdall, a friend who has known Platform since 1986. We first came into contact with her via the producer and curator Richard Demarco: along with him, she was among the first to champion artist Joseph Beuys in the English-speaking world. Beuys’ art and politics were critical influences in...
Conversations with Suzi Gablik – Living in wartime.
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Apr 29, 2017
I’ve recently returned from a visit to my friend and mentor, Suzi Gablik, in Virginia, USA. She has been an inspiration to so many over the past 33 years since the publication of ‘Has Modernism Failed’, and later her book ‘Conversations Before The End of Time‘. Her work harnessed an ecological sensibility in the...
