Copenhagen talks inspire artists
Updated on 06 December 2009
Over the next two weeks, scientists and world leaders will be locked in talks on the planet and as climate change prevails in the headlines, it is no surprise it is also dominating the art world.
Various artists have been responding to the debate, from the literal and figurative to the highly conceptual, and even songs written about something completely different.
A slideshow of photographs by Mark Edwards documenting enironmental issues has been set to Bob Dylan's A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall.
The film has been touring for three years and it has been shown to corporations, parliaments and scientists.
Now it is going to Copenhagen and the song is set to become the climate conference soundtrack.
It is unclear what Dylan himself thinks about climate change. When asked about it, he said 'Where's the global warming? It's freezing here' but he has given the exhibition his blessing and the inscrutable song associated with the Cuban missile crisis will gain yet another cause.
Sculptors Mark Coreth and Duncan Hamilton are also hoping to have an impact at Copenhagen.
They have created a life-sized polar bear from a nine-tonne block of ice. It is nearly two metres tall, with a polar bear's skeleton cast in bronze frozen at its centre.
The ice will slowly melt over about two weeks to reveal the skeleton inside and the process may be sped up by members of the public touching the ice.
Artists Ackroyd and Harvey found a polar bear's thigh bone on one of many expeditions they have made to the Arctic.
They reduced it to carbon-graphite and then used the dust to create a synthetic diamond.
It is not surprising campaigners have gone for the polar bear as their poster boy but artists also say there is something about the creature that captures the imagination.
Whether or not world leaders in Copenhagen can decide on a way forward on carbon emissions, the debate is clearly fuelling artistic creativity.
The question is how long species like the polar bear will survive.
