Next weekend I’ll be participating in “Sketching Climate Stories” at the Global Climate Action Summit in San Francisco. The Bay Area urban sketching groups are joining together to document the Climate Summit and the people who are coming to it. We’ll be doing portraits in pictures and words, telling the stories of how individuals and their communities have been affected by climate change—and how they’re working on solutions.
2 Interview/sketch pieces, 8.5X11″, pen, water soluble pencil, w/c on w/c paper
So I got together with my sketch buddies this week to practice interviewing and sketching in pairs. The three of us had lots to relate about how Global Warming is affecting our community here in the post-Tubbs fire era.
Bettina’s comment: “The threat of fire was always more theoretical before . .now the danger can’t be ignored. It’s right on our doorstep!” could have been made by just about anyone here in the Santa Rosa and other areas. And when asked what she is working on, Carole responded that she is using her art to “bring awareness to social issues like Climate Change”.
And if you’re looking for ways to do the same, read on here.
We’ll be starting at the Rise for Climate march on Sunday and dropping in on different events and actions during the week. We have applied for press credentials to do sketch reportage of the GCAS events in the Moscone Center.
The main groups involved are the SF Bay Area Urban Sketchers, a chapter of the international Urban Sketchers organization, with 220 chapters around the world, and SF Sketchers, a San Francisco-based meetup group with nearly 3,000 members.
We will be posting our sketches online in the blog SketchingClimateStories.org (currently under construction), a Facebook group, Sketching Climate Stories and on Instagram and Twitter with the hashtag #sketchingclimatestories.
The sketches themselves will be shown at several locations during the week, including a popup show at the Contemporary Jewish Museum on their Green Thursday evening. We are planning a larger show of all the sketches after the Summit and are considering ways that the climate stories could evolve into a long-term project, documenting the effects of climate change on frontline communities. (I would add here, that one of the frontline communities will be here in Sonoma County where we’ll be commemorating the first anniversary of the Oct 2018 firestorms this year with events by many local groups.)
Here are Inks to currently scheduled events (this will change as more events are added)
Practice session at Arch Art Supplies, September 1
Reportage sketching at the march on September 8
Popup show of the sketches at the Contemporary Jewish Museum on Green Thursday, September 13
It’s all pretty exciting and constantly evolving. Feel free to contact me if you wonder how you can get involved, either in the S.F. event or in October for our Sonoma Co. events.
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