The world is facing a series of linked environmental crises. In October 2022, the UN warned that the world’s governments are not yet on track to keep global heating below 1.5 degrees, and the window for action is rapidly closing. We are already seeing the impacts of existing warming with devastating droughts, storms and floods across the world. Related crises include collapsing biodiversity, dangerous levels of air pollution, and plastic contamination in our rivers and oceans. Without urgent action from across society, these problems will rapidly escalate.

The art world has an important role to play. Arts organisations – particularly in the Global North – have a disproportionately large impact on the environment, mainly due to a great deal of international travel, art shipping, and the high use of energy and materials. We need to act urgently to reduce these impacts in line with what science is telling us. As arts organisations, we also have an opportunity to use our public platform and cultural influence to set a positive example, encouraging and supporting others to take action and helping shift the public debate. At Topical Ventures, our values and mission are to bridge cultures and to merge art fields (e.g. contemporary art,  music, cinema, and gastronomy). The projects we create communicate the problems stemming from the Anthropocene / Capitolocene and new models of living towards the Chthulucene, in the hope to generate action.

Rather than merely communicating these issues, we need to take urgent environmental action ourselves, because art and culture across the world is directly threatened by the climate crisis, while also holding many of the most effective solutions to the climate crisis. 

As an organisation, we know that our main direct environmental impacts include travel and transportation of artworks. We have committed to tackling these impacts by: 

• Joining the Gallery Climate Coalition, and pledging to keep our carbon emissions to the lowest possible.
• Regularly calculating the carbon footprint of our operations, to track progress towards this target.
• Setting specific targets for the major parts of our footprint, including:
• Choosing train over plane as a method of travel whenever possible.
• Ensuring the majority of our international shipping is carried out by sea, rail or road rather than air.
• Ensuring all of our packing materials are reusable or curbside recyclable by 2026, as a step towards zero-waste operations by 2030. 
• Incorporating CO2-negative materials or production methods.
• Using only low or zero-emissions vehicles for local deliveries by 2025.
  
  The actions we are taking to meet these targets include:
• Speaking to our shippers about alternatives to air freight. Planning our exhibitions and events with care to minimise the need for air freight.
• Reviewing our staff travel policies and practices, and planning our attendance at international events to reduce the need for air travel.
• Working with other GCC members on projects to help develop more sustainable packaging, transport and energy-saving solutions for the whole sector.
• Speaking to our suppliers and service providers about their carbon footprint, and looking for opportunities to encourage them to take action, or to switch to alternative suppliers who will.
• Maintaining the Green Ambassador, which tracks progress on all of these targets and actions at least twice a year.

To take full responsibility for our emissions, we will offset the CO2 produced by us through a Strategic Climate Fund. Following guidance from the Gallery Climate Coalition, this money will be spent on measures to accelerate our emissions reductions and support frontline climate solutions around the world that are making a difference right now. We will report on how we spent this money at the end of each financial year. We aim to take action in line with the principles of climate justice, recognising the connections between the climate crisis and other global injustices. We want our environmental actions to support - rather than undermine or ignore - the needs of people on the frontlines of marginalisation and injustice. We have set these targets and are taking actions in the knowledge that we aren’t yet doing everything right. We still have a great deal to do and much to learn. We welcome feedback from anyone on this environmental statement, our targets, and our plans for action.

We are pleased to announce that Topical Ventures show has successfully qualified as a 2022 and 2023 Active Member with @galleryclimatecoalition! To achieve Active status we had to demonstrate that our organisation had implemented environmental sustainability best practice in line with GCC guidance.

Active Membership is not a certification of sustainability nor a claim that we are doing things perfectly or have all the answers - none of us are at this point. We’re all doing our best to assess, report and reduce our impact, setting targets in line with science, taking any actions we can and working out other solutions as we go.

We encourage all of our peers and colleagues to visit the galleryclimatecoalition page or website to learn more about the initiative and how to get involved!